In response to the upheavals in the Senate and Senator Loren Legarda’s complicit participation in these activities, a group of cultural workers have decided to disassociate from Sen. Legarda who supported them in the Kislap Diwa project.
“Championship of the arts is not measured by past patronage. It is measured by the courage to stand against political convenience when it is costly to do so. On this, the Senator has failed,” they said.
A total of 23 members of Kislap Diwa have signed the statement expressing sorrow and dismay over Senator Legarda’s recent actions at the Senate. These include artists Fil dela Cruz, Virgilio Aviado, Salvador Ching, Alfredo Esquillo, Kora Dandan Albano, Celeste Lecaroz, Paul Eric Roca, Waway Saway, and Richard Montero, and poets Fidel Rillo, Vim Nadera, Michael M. Coroza, Mikael de Lara Co, Aldrin Pentero, Roy Cagalingan, Niles Jordan Breis, En Villasis, Anastacia B. Viola, Edgar Calabia Samar, Noel del Prado, Alfonso Manalastas, Ralph Lorenz Fonte, and Joey Tabula.
Kislap Diwa was a collaborative cultural arts project supported by Sen. Loren Legarda that paired poets and visual artists to translate intangible Filipino cultural heritage into paintings, sculptures and poems. The project was mounted in 2023 and 2025, with the works exhibited at the National Museum.
In the statement, the group said, “We, the artists and poets who participated in Kislap Diwa under the patronage of Senator Loren Legarda, write in dismay and sorrow over the recent conduct of the Senate of the Republic. For years, the Senator has presented herself as a defender of culture and creative life. Many of us believed her. Our gathering was made possible by that belief. But her recent actions have put this belief in serious doubt.”
Aside from Sen. Legarda’s lack of explanation for joining the new majority and voting for Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano as Senate President, the group also cited the lawmaker’s implied support for the “protective custody” extended to Sen. Bato dela Rosa who had been issued a public arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity. “This occurred as the House of Representatives transmitted the second articles of impeachment against the Vice President…. On May 13, gunfire inside the Senate building made unmistakable the alarming lengths to which institutional integrity has been compromised in service of political interests,” the statement underscored.
The Kislap Diwa poets and artists pointed out that Sen. Legarda “who invokes the language of culture has now joined a bloc whose inaugural act was to shield an individual from international justice. She has done so in silence. Whatever her reasons, the effect is plain: she has lent her name and through her, a portion of ours, to a Senate that has chosen to be a refuge rather than a forum.”
Quoting Emilio Jacinto who declared, “Ating hanapin ang liwanag, tayo’y huwag mabighani sa ningning,” the group categorically withdrew connection to the Senator and her office, and from her future endeavors for the arts. “We formally disassociate ourselves from Senator Loren Legarda. We do not consent to our names, participation, or work under Kislap Diwa being used as part of her cultural legacy or in support of her political conduct. We will not accept further invitations to appear, read, or be honored in any capacity associated with her office.”
