By PABLO A. TARIMAN
The Ideal Theater which he designed in 1933 was where you saw “The Singing Nun” and “Dr. Zhivago” in the 60s.
Most young men growing up in the 60s saw their first adult film in Galaxy Theater also designed by Antonio. You saw the film version of the musical “Show Boat” in Lyric Theater in Escolta designed by Antonio in
You saw your favorite stars from Sampaguita Pictures in Life Theater also designed by Antonio in 1941.
The FEU Auditorium — as well as several buildings in the campus where you watched one of your first plays and classical concerts — was also designed by him.
Pianists Cecile Licad, Ingrid Sala Santamaria and Reynaldo Reyes performed in one of the function rooms of the Manila Polo Club which Antonio also designed.
Then you wonder who the architect was and his background.
A visit to what looks like an ancestral house in Zamora St. in Pasay City brings you face to face with the legacy of architect Pablo Antonio who was named National Artist for Architecture in 1976, the second one to be named thus after another illustrious architect, Juan Nakpil.
But no matter, this is a house marked by simplicity and good taste.
This was where Architect Antonio lived all his life with his family.
The key to his life and architectural designs is summed up in the recently launched coffee table book, “The Architectural Legacy of Pablo S. Antonio: 1901-1975.”
The 125-page book published by Reyes Publishing Inc. is a collaborative work of several writers and edited by Sylvia Roces Montilla with book design by Joey Yepez and with Sonia Ner as project director.
On the whole, you get several portraits of the architect as written by ten contributing writers five of whom are his sons, one a granddaughter and two architects and a family friend.
The teenage orphan was schooled in the public school system in Tondo, later worked as draftsman in the Bureau of Public Works and took short-lived formal course in architecture at the Mapua Institute of Technology.
It was while he worked as draftsman and construction foreman of the Santa Clara Lumber and Construction Company that he met his patron, the company’s founder, Don Ramon Arevalo. The construction magnate was so impressed by Antonio’s drawings he gave him a scholarship to finish architecture in the University of London. With his immense talent and diligence, he finished the 5-year course in only three years.
After finishing his studies in 1927, he was hired as in-house architect of Santa Clara Lumber and Construction Company which serviced the construction needs of Manila’s upper crust. The rest is history.
The most intimate and revealing profile of the architect is written by Alfredo Roces whose first cousin — Marina — the architect eventually married in Shanghai in 1938.
Roces’s personal portrait of Antonio: “He came across to me as warm honest, talented, but humble human companion rather than some great public figure, the National Artist in Architecture, that he was and is. His output is mind-boggling: from his drawing board emerged a gaggle of cinema palaces, key commercial buildings, and a host of private mansions, port terminals, banks, hotels, restaurants, factories, social clubs and even tombs and mausoleums. In originality, vitality and versatility, Pablo Antonio was the foremost architect of his day.”
You just have to review the old photos of Life and Ideal theaters, the Manila Polo Club and the FEU campus that you can’t help but agree with his National Artist citation given by the CCP thus: “Time has proven his worth; his works shall outlast many a rhyme. Durable as stone. permanent as the spirit of art itself, Pablo A. Antonio’s creations are unique and distinct contributions to Philippine architecture and to the developing culture of the nation. In these achievements, the country takes just pride.”