Provenance: Bulacan

ABOUT THE WORK

Every house during the colonial period had an altar with a cross, with the more affluent households having crucifixes with other figures forming a tableau of the crucifixion. Calvary scenes in general contained an image of the crucified Christ, the Sorrowful Mother or Dolorosa, St. John the Evangelist and Mary Magdalene. The last is usually portrayed in a kneeling posture embracing the cross. After the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 glass domes protecting flower arrangements in small porcelain vases began to be imported from France. Initially, these flower arrangements were placed on top of center or side tables in the sala, but eventually, somebody had the bright idea of using them to encase ivory santos clothed in gold-embroidered vestments. The hermetically sealed domes prevented the air from tarnishing the gold embroidery and the gilding of the bases. This ivory Calvary scene in a virina is one commonly found in the house of an upper class family. Its kamagong cross is bordered by line inlay of lanite and is mounted on a simulated rocky base carved from baticuling. The cross is ornamented with embossed and chased gold and silver metalwork executed by a silversmith consisting of: rays or rayos, terminals called cantoneras, an INRI, a sun in splendor and a skull with crossed bones. The silver rays surround a gold applique embossed and chased with a symmetrical design of meandering scrolls terminating with leaves and flowers bordered on the outer edge by stylized clouds typical of the late-19th century. The golden cantoneras, embossed and chased with an acanthus frieze, is edged with multiple moldings and terminated by a finial in the shape of a granada or pomegranate, a fruit symbolic of the Catholic Church. The INRI is embossed and chased on a golden plate. The sun in splendor has a glass disc with a face painted behind glass. A gold skull and crossed bones, an allusion to Golgotha, ‘The Place of Skulls’, where Christ was crucified, is attached to the lower part of the cross. The ivory corpus is attached to the cross by three golden nails set with a white sapphire and has a perizonium or loincloth, locally called a bahag or tapis, a crown of thorns and trespotencias, the three rays emanating from the pate that symbolize Christ’s potencies or power, all executed in solid gold. The tapis, gathered in fringed folds on the left in a stylized knot, is ornamented with a large, highly embossed peony surrounded by a leafy scroll. The corpus has a wig with a golden crown of thorns and trespotencias. The figures of the Dolorosa, St. Mary Magdalen and St. John the Evangelist all have ivory heads and hands attached to mannequins clothed in satin robes. The three figures all have wigs and are no longer wearing their original, gold-embroidered vestments. Their clothes must have been replaced a few decades ago, as their simplicity and quality are not keeping with the period of the statues. -Martin I. Tinio, Jr.