The Cultural Center of the Philippines
On how a building can portray power and galvanize the fight for democracy
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On February 10th, 1969, Senator Ninoy Aquino stood before the Congress of the Philippines and said: “I have risen at the risk of her fury, because country and people demand they cease those wild palace and yacht bacchanalian feasts.”
Aquino was calling out Filipino First Lady Imelda Marcos. He described her as “The Fabulous One,” critiquing her extravagant development projects, most notably the Cultural Center, which he dubbed “a monument to shame.”
For over twenty years, Imelda was First Lady of the Philippines. She took on the role in 1965, when her husband Ferdinand was democratically elected; but, in 1972, Ferdinand enacted martial law, ruling the Philippines as a dictator until he and Imelda were exiled in 1986. During this time, the Marcos family embezzled billions of dollars from the government. While the Philippines struggled with economic crises and civil unrest, Imelda and Ferdinand lived a lavish life — traveling the world, buying designer clothing, building a disco in the palace.
The Cultural Center, constructed during the Marcos’ first term (before martial law), embodied this opulence. It was modernist, designed to “impress pedestrians with its scale and grandeur,” according to urban planning scholar Gavin Shatkin. The building was was intended to inspire both domestic and international audiences, showcasing the Marcos’ transformation of the Philippines and hosting global events (e.g., 1976 Miss Universe Pageant).
However, this impressive facade hid a darker reality. Before her husband was inaugurated, Imelda started fundraising for the Cultural Center. Even with grants, public fundraising, proceeds from a production of Flower Drum Song, and financial support from the US Government, Imelda was short on funds to build her Cultural Center, especially as the budget ballooned from 15 million PHP to 50 million PHP. Thus, the project took on a $7M USD loan, a decision that was heavily criticized as wasteful spending by the Marcos administration.
It was this move that led Aquino to make his speech in 1969. “I have risen at the risk of her spite,” Aquino said. “Because out there, barely 200 meters away from a fabulous Imelda Cultural Center, a ghetto sprawls, where thousands of Filipinos are kept captives by misery and poverty.”
The Cultural Center wasn’t Imelda’s only project. She built a bridge, a convention center, an arts center, an organ transplant institute, a hotel, and an airport terminal. Most were funded by foreign loans, and while these buildings created an impression of Filipino progress, the loans required to build them placed the country into debt and serious economic struggles.
Further, while the Marcos regime invested in these projects, the capital city of Manila continued to lack affordable housing, and the Marcos’ eviction campaign to build these grandiose structures only worsened housing conditions for the poor. The Cultural Center, in turn, came to represent the regime’s corruption and the country’s economic challenges. Imelda, in what feels like ignorant irony, often spoke of the building as a symbol of the country’s “shining future against our impoverished past.”
This was Imelda’s “edifice complex,” a phrase coined by Filipino artist Behn Cervantes to call out the Marcos’ use of buildings as political propaganda. In 2005, architecture critic Deyan Sudjic wrote on the edifice complex: “Building is the means by which the egotism of the individual is expressed in its most naked form.”
Using buildings to present political or corporate power isn’t just a historical Filipino phenomenon.
We could point to the construction of Dubai’s Burj Khalifa, the tallest tower in the world, as a show of power by the House of Maktoum (Dubai’s ruling family).
We could point to Apple’s circular headquarters as a signal of its influence and power in the tech world.
We could point to Louis XIV’s construction of the Palace of Versailles to signal his wealth and power.
It’s a “discourse of statue, status, stability, establishment, and estate,” per urban theorist Kim Dovey. All of these concepts stem from the same root: sta, “to stand.” Buildings stand for something: in some cases, a physical manifestation of power and prestige.
From Aquino’s perspective, what matters is the context in which the building is constructed. It’s not about the Cultural Center; it’s about how its construction ignored suffering, fueled corruption, and caused pain.
For his entire life, Aquino was a vocal critic of the Marcos regime. He was jailed for his dissonance for seven years, before being exiled to the United States to receive heart surgery. In 1983, while living in the United States, Aquino — hearing reports of increasing unrest in the Philippines under the Marcos dictatorship — decided to return to his home. Even though he was warned that he would likely be assassinated if he returned to the country, on August 21st, 1983, Aquino boarded a flight to the Philippines to — in his words — “join the ranks of those struggling to restore our rights and freedoms through non-violence.”
When the plane landed and Aquino stepped out onto the tarmac, he was shot in the head. A report later revealed the military was behind the assassination.
Last Monday, August 21st, 2023, marked 40 years since Aquino’s assassination. August 21st is “Ninoy Aquino Day” — a non-working holiday in the Philippines that recognizes Aquino’s fight for freedom, justice, and human rights.
And, according to some, today the Cultural Center stands often underutilized and seemingly abandoned.
The story of Imelda, Ferdinand, and Ninoy is currently featured in the Broadway musical Here Lies Love, with a score by David Byrne (Talking Heads). In the show, the song “Fabulous One” dramatizes Aquino’s 1969 speech:
As a second gen from filipino immigrants I hear very little about the complex history of the Philippines out in typical news/blogging circulation, but it actually has a fascinating history of activism. Thanks for writing this, I really enjoyed reading. The last part gave me shivers.