Eyeing the Golden Triga

Manila, Philippines - Can the Philippines bring home the Golden Triga?

This question is foremost in the minds of many theater practitioners worldwide as the Philippines participates anew in the Prague Quadrennial (PQ) on Performance Design and Space after a long hiatus.

Scheduled on June 16-26, this year’s mammoth event, considered the Olympics of Theater Design, will be held at the Veletzrini Palace, Prague’s national gallery, with 76 nations participating, and an estimated attendance of over 5,000 delegates from all over the world. The coveted Golden Triga, the grand prize of the PQ, is a magnificent emblem of a golden horse-drawn sleigh based on the statue on top of Prague’s National Theater.

Randy Gener, who received the Pamana ng Pilipino Presidential Award last year from President Aquino for excellence in the field of theater arts and creativity, sums up the PQ’s highlights through the years: “Now 40 years old, the PQ is the planet’s largest competitive exposition of contemporary stage design and theater architecture.   It is to the Czech Republic what the Venice Biennale is to Italy – global convergence where everyone who cares about the stage flocks to look, sample and judge the state of new theater from around the world. The crucial twist, however, is that stage design is being exhibited at PQ on a pedestal of contemplation, and commerce is not part of the equation. Art dealers, collectors and hedge-fund types rarely flock to PQ.”

The coveted Golden Triga.

The Philippine pavilion, conceptualized and put together by national curator Rollie de Leon, aims to change that perspective by incorporating work from realized live productions in Philippine theater, broadcasting and advertising. Backed by ITI-UNESCO, the Advertising Suppliers Association of the Philippines, International Container Terminal Services Inc. and Manila Broadcasting Company, the Philippine effort will also showcase student works put together by De La Salle University’s Harlequin Theater Guild in the context of Philippine mythology and folklore, thereby underscoring the importance of oral tradition in Filipino grassroots theater.  

The competitive 10-day design expo is organized by the Czech Ministry of Culture and implemented by the Theater Institute Prague under the auspices of the International Organization of Scenographers, Theater Architects and Technicians.

The first PQ in 1967, dedicated to stagings of Mozart operas in the city where Don Giovanni was first performed, grew out of the Bienal de São Paulo (Biennale of Visual Art) of the 1950s and 1960s. “Today, the PQ is a mammoth beast that will not stop growing. Statistics alone tell a major part of the story. Of the estimated 23,000 visitors from 76 countries (a new record), 5,000 were registered participants and professionals; another 3,700 attendees were children.” 

Four years ago, entries to the PQ underwent radical changes. Design veterans bewailed the increasing trend toward fewer models and the lack of physical artifacts; while younger practitioners stressed the greater importance of digital and virtual presentations, with some extremists even shoving display aside in favor of live interactions.  

With the lack of resources, the Philippines will definitely not compete in terms of new technology in the digital age. De Leon and his motley crew believe that visitors will respond well to the tactile quality of Filipino design, where the presence of the artist is felt. 

For starters, he crafted the national pavilion out of bamboo, inspired by the Singkaban master craftsmen of Bulacan, whose attention to detail cannot be undermined. The DLSU student team, in turn, harkens to a stylized banyan (balete) tree.Contents of both pavilions have been carefully selected for their ability to entice visitors to feel and not just think. 

The Philippine pavilion under construction with national curator Rollie de Leon .

Whether the Philippines’ tack of conceptualism will wow this year’s PQ jury remains to be seen. De Leon remains upbeat as he envisions the Philippine pavilion being open enough to articulate the Filipino’s state of mind – not simply as a retrospective of craft well done, but with organic design structures that dare to perform acts of transformation. 

Believing that the Filipino fiesta itself best encapsulates grassroots theater, our myriad cultural nuances, and commercial viability in live entertainment, the Philippine delegation will harness the power of the fiesta to attract and mesmerize audiences both in the visual and performing arts. With Manila Broadcasting Company’s sizzling summer spectacle – the Aliwan Fiesta – at the core of presentations in both the national and student pavilions, it will be interesting to see if the mammoth event can be showcased in a minimal fashion and still resound with the sights and sounds that have defined it year after year. 

One things is certain. As Gener so aptly summed it up, the Prague Quadrennial will again be “a meeting place, a global klatch, a transnational feast, a micro-universe, a display of passions, a designer’s paradise, a Babel of vocabularies, a vast university, a commitment, an aspiration, a competition.   

Who knows? Perhaps the Golden Triga is attainable after all.