No Such Thing as the Good Old Days

‘NIL,’ curated by Erwin Romulo and Neil Daza, features a raw and at times graphic exhibit displaying crime scene photographs from 1987 to 2002, and video works by Cinema Regla.

MANILA, Philippines — On a cold weekday morning in April, I received a message that one of my old high school friends had died. The cause was suicide. I had stared death in the face before, at a younger age even, but those were accidental deaths, or due to sickness. I’d never had someone I know take his or her own life. There were close calls, but he was the first I knew to actually do it. I cried two days later.

It’s a rainy afternoon in June, and I’m at the Artinformal gallery in Greenhills. I’m here to see the exhibition “NIL” curated by Erwin Romulo and Neil Daza. I show up early, and decide to walk through the gallery by myself first. There’s a sign on the door saying picture-taking is prohibited inside the gallery. I walk through the black cloth behind the door.

On my left is a wall of text, written by Bert Sulat, Jr. It’s talking about the exhibit. I can barely get through it all as I see the photos out of the corner of my eye. Bloodied bodies framed by Monobloc chairs, a car full of dead men with warnings hung around their necks, a smiling man conducting an autopsy on a criminal. Each pulls my attention away. I wander through.

Anyone who’s witnessed a car crash knows the feeling. It’s gruesome and horrible, the wreckage seeming surreal amongs the normality of cars around you. But you can’t look away. In fact, there’s a crowd. You slow down to get a glimpse. You fear to see a body. You want to see a body. “NIL” is a front-row seat to the carnage. It is an exhibit of crime scene photographs from 1987 to 2002, showing the victims in all their bloody reality. Upstairs and to the right, there is a video installation showing interviews with the photographers.

There's was a room next to the door and it comes with a warning. “In this room are pictures of people who have committed suicide.” Numbers to local suicide hotlines were placed underneath. I walk in to a room with five pictures, blown up to life size. All of them, victims of suicide, still hanging from their ropes. They were flanked by the policemen sent to investigate. I stay for less than a minute.

I speak first with Neil Daza. He is an established filmmaker, having worked on films like Bwaya, Emir, and Dekada ’70. Before his work as a cinematographer, he was a photojournalist working the midnight police beat. It served as his inspiration for his 2006 exhibit “Detritus” at Blacksoup, a precursor to “NIL.” Like this one, it featured pictures from crime scenes. Unlike this one, the photos were smaller, and less curated. He tells me how the work helps us reflect on our present times, and our current reality of police killings. I can’t help but agree, while staring at four photos of dead men in a car, signs hung around their necks reading “HOLDAPER.” “These are things that actually happened, and are still happening,” he says.

I speak next to Erwin Romulo. Editor, writer, producer and composer, he helped curate “NIL” after having been moved by Daza’s “Detritus” 12 years ago. He’s curated exhibitions such as “Everyday Impunity: Ang Mga Walang Pangalan” at Art Fair Philippines 2018, and was one of the curators of “Wasak! Filipino Art Today,” shown at Berlin in 2015. “Our central thesis is the idea that there was no such thing as the ‘good old days,’” he tells me. “To move forward, we have to come to terms with what we’ve always been.” He speaks calmly about the exhibit. I can’t imagine how, considering he’s sorted through hundreds of photos like the ones in “NIL.”

I ask him what message he was trying to convey with the exhibit. He isn’t sure. He says he wants the exhibit to ask questions instead of provide answers. He thinks it’s important that we see and talk about death. He mentions how in some cultures, death is seen as an important part of life, to be seen and not hidden away. “Why shouldn’t we see it?” he asks.

I ask myself that as I stand in the lobby. There are more attendees now, and the room is buzzing. It feels strange, seeing people walk through crowds and happily greet each other, while surrounded by the images of death. Neil told me he didn’t feel right when people would congratulate him on the exhibit. A waiter hands me a glass of wine. I feel strange.

Erwin told me the exhibit was meant to ask questions and I am full of them. Why do we do this to each other? Why do we allow this? Some may see these as acts of crime, and pray for a stronger police presence. Some minds will wander towards today’s extrajudicial killings, and seek justice for the thousands denied due process. All see blood, and madness.

I’m in the suicide room for a second time. I’m standing with a few more people, feeling a little calmer than before. There’s a quiet violence behind the deaths here, self-directed. I’m too well aware that there are multitudes of reasons to take one’s life. Between criminals, gangs and policemen, there’s a shade of clarity. With time, there is hope for understanding. Whatever truths lay behind these bodies is beyond the shroud of death.

It’s late May, and I’m at a funeral. A different death, a different suicide. I think of my friends, and family, and I think of all the people who rage against the dying light. I’m surrounded by people I’m glad to see, all of us saddened that it was because of this.

It’s June, and I read about Anthony Bourdain’s death. It’s a day before I walk into the exhibit. I remember watching his shows late into the night. He brought me so much joy and now he’s gone.

I stand in a room of suicides and I can offer no consolation, I have no answers. Death is real in the Philippines, and I’m reminded every day. But not like this.

I take a jeepney home from the exhibit. I sit, surrounded by others who take these same streets, read the same news, hear the same stories. We’re all in this place, together. I ask Erwin about Manila. “I love Manila. I also hate it. But I love it more than I hate it.”

I can’t help but agree.