February is National Arts Month in the Philippines and this year’s theme is “Ani ng Sining: Katotohanan at Giting.” We are great at coming up with themes but these words should be directed at our own government. Because the truth is public investment in the arts lack courage and determination.
I believe this lack of public investment in the arts is deliberate under our current system that is still dominated by the colonial and capitalist framework.
The deliberate underinvestment in the arts within colonial and capitalist systems is not an accidental oversight. It is a logical outcome of their core values, which prioritize extraction, control, and profit over expression, critique, and collective well-being.
Art is a threat to control under the colonial legacy. Colonialism was not just a territorial conquest; it was a cultural project to dismantle indigenous worldviews and establish the colonizer’s culture as superior. This legacy still persists in the Philippines today.
The colonial powers actively suppressed indigenous languages, spiritual practices, and art forms. These were seen as repositories of alternative identities and histories that challenged colonial authority. The goal was to break cultural continuity and create a subjugated labor force disconnected from its own heritage.
Colonizers did not just suppress, they also extracted value and knowledge. Material artifacts were looted as trophies, intangible cultural knowledge (medicinal plants, agricultural techniques embedded in stories) was often extracted without acknowledgment. This established a pattern where the cultural wealth of the colonized was physically and intellectually possessed by the colonizer.
After suppression and extraction, it is not surprising that our “colonial taste” persists until now. Today’s global “art world” is still largely centered in former colonial cities like New York, London, Paris. It often validates art from the Global South through a Western ethnographic or exoticizing lens, while undervaluing contemporary artistic dialogues rooted in local, non-Western traditions. This creates a dependency where recognition and market value are dictated externally.
Which brings us to the capitalist framework that evaluates everything by its market value and productivity. Art that does not fit this mold is systematically devalued.
Capital seeks the highest financial return. Publicly funded art that fosters social critique, uncomfortable dialogue, or pure aesthetic experience offers no guaranteed return on investment (ROI). So investment is diverted to sectors with clearer, faster profit cycles like technology, infrastructure, and resource extraction.
Under a capitalist system, art is labeled as “non-essential.” When a government pursues “austerity measures,” arts funding is the first cut. This frames art as a luxury good rather than a public good essential for education, mental health, and social cohesion. This creates a self-fulfilling prophecy — defund art, and because it is not funded, it has lesser social impact, which leads to justification for further cuts.
In a market-driven economy, art is co-opted. When it is valued, it is often as a financial asset for the wealthy (high-end gallery markets, art as investment) or as content for commodification (used by entertainment monopolies). This privileges art that is decorative, apolitical, or easily marketed and marginalizes the grassroots, experimental, and critical art that sustains a vibrant culture.
Colonial and capitalist systems work together to create a powerful, self-justifying logic for underinvestment.
Colonialism devalued and disrupted our local artistic ecosystems. Post-colonial capitalist states, often burdened by debt and structural adjustment, inherit this devaluation and adopt a narrow view of “development” that is focused on tangible economic outputs. With the arts already weakened and framed as unproductive and non-essential, this leads to chronic public underinvestment.
This lack of public support pushes art further into the private market, where only commercially viable or externally validated (by former colonial centers) forms survive, further eroding diverse, critical, and community-based art.
In short, this deliberate underinvestment in the arts is a tool of control. And there are two core mechanisms that sustain these patterns: intellectual property (IP) law and cultural philanthropy. These systems either extract value from cultural expressions without reinvesting in their source communities or channel funding toward art that aligns with colonial and capitalist values.
Western IP law is based on individual ownership and monopoly rights, clashing with the collective, custodial nature of much indigenous art and knowledge. It facilitates biopiracy, where corporations patent traditional knowledge like medicinal plants without consent or fair benefit-sharing.
Cultural philanthropy, on the other hand, shapes art through donor preferences. A small number of large, elite institutions receive the majority of arts philanthropy. When private giving dominates arts funding, donor agenda can override artistic or community need.
I believe the first step the Philippines can take in promoting the arts is to acknowledge that we are still dominated by the colonial and capitalist framework. We must recognize the systems at play and analyze how they all reinforce each other before we can begin to solve our problems. We must accept that this is the reality, then start thinking of an alternative system we can create to benefit all of us. Understanding these existing systems is key to challenging them.
The “katotohanan” (truth) is a society rich in critical, diverse, and historically rooted art is harder to manipulate, less focused on pure consumption, and more capable of imagining alternatives to the status quo. Sustaining such art requires “giting” (bravery, courage) to consciously reject colonial-capitalist logic that sees value only in what can be mined, monetized, or measured.
Oh, and the corruption we are experiencing in this country is definitely linked to government’s very low budget allocation for the arts.
