ILOILO CITY – An architect and two other persons are vying for the winning design of a monument that depicts the Dinagyang, Iloilo annual festival that honors the Santo Niño (Child Jesus).
“We are inching closer to put up a monument that will immortalize the Dinagyang Festival,” said Fr. Frederick C. Comendador, president of the University of San Agustin (USA).
In a virtual ceremony for its 117th founding anniversary Thursday, July 15, USA announced that Architect Adonis C. Canonicato, Franc Garcia, and Harry Mark Gonzales are the three finalists.
Comendador explained that the monument will also be the university’s initiative in commemorating the 500 years of Christianity in the country.
The bronze sculpture that will be built on the Iloilo Esplanade, a river park near the university, is going to depict the significant events of how the Santo Niño became the centerpiece of Iloilo’s most revered festival.
From Cebu, the Santo Niño de Cebu made its way to Iloilo in 1968 as a gift to an Augustinian parish priest of San Jose Parish Church.
The arrival of the Santo Niño de Cebu in Iloilo was initially greeted with a small celebration that would later become the Dinagyang Festival.
The idea for the Dinagyang Monument was broached last year when Comendador met with the Zonta Club of Iloilo City Inc. led by Ma. Amelita E. Lazarraga and Ruth Tirol Jarantilla as well as Joe Marie Agriam of the Friends of Saint Augustine.
The creation of the Dinagyang monument will be built in partnership with the National Historical Commission of the Philippine (NHCP), the National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA), the Iloilo City government, the Iloilo provincial government, the Congressional Office of the Lone District of Iloilo, and Iloilo philanthropists.