The Italian Legacy in the Dominican Republic

THE ITALIAN LEGACY IN THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC

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ican Republic, received upon his return from Curaçao on March 15, 1844 with the greeting, ¡Salve, Padre de la

Patria! (Hail, Father of our Homeland!).

Now the City Council itself intends to carry out another work of gratitude and inspiration: the crea-

tion of a bronze statue, representing the illustrious patrician, which will be placed in the public square

bearing his name, the theater of his first victory in 1843 against the party that imposed oppression.

An eminently national work, it is supported and sustained by thirty-five municipalities; thirty boards;

eighteen newspapers, and countless citizens, aware of their duty, scattered throughout the Republic

and abroad. For this act of reparation, the Central Monument Board, made up of the undersigned, and

on behalf of the Santo Domingo City Council, has the honor of asking the Honorable National Con-

gress for their permission to enact a law to erect the statue on the aforementioned site, and the funds

which the nation must contribute for such a just and patriotic work (Blanco Díaz, 2010, 237).

Tejera’s request received no immediate response; however, in 1887 the Dominican painter Alejandro

Bonilla created a portrait of Duarte based on memory, from when the painter met Duarte in Venezuela, and

by using the daguerreotype of the Venezuelan Prospero Rey from 1873. A second recreation of the face of

Juan Pablo Duarte, based on Bonilla’s work, was carried out in 1890 by Abelardo Rodríguez Urdaneta, in both

pictorial and sculptural versions, as noted by Duarte biographer Belkis Adróver de Cibrán: “Abelardo created

several busts and a high-relief of Juan Pablo Duarte; and the monument project, commissioned by the Most

Excellent City Council of San Pedro de Macorís.

The first bust appears to be from the year 1890, inspired by the famous portrait of Alejandro Bonilla”

(Adróver de Cibrán, 1974, p. 99). This image created by Abelardo, according to Adróver de Cibrán, is the most

well-known and well-regarded among Dominicans and accepted as an accurate depiction. In 1913, the sculptor

made a second bust of Duarte, evidencing greater mastery of sculptural technique. This piece is considered “...

an ‘Abelardian’ Duarte, far from Bonilla’s influence and where the artist incorporated some autobiographical

features” (Nacidit Perdomo, 2015). The piece was officially commissioned for the Gallery of National Heroes

at the Palace of the Pan American Union in Washington, D.C.

The work was commissioned in 1913, with a payment order issued by Congress inMarch 1925 (Adróver

de Cibrán, 1974, 99) for one thousand [...] pesos in American gold to cover the necessary expenses to

cast the bust of Father of the Homeland Juan Pablo Duarte in plaster and send it to Washington to be

placed in the Gallery of National Heroes within the building of the Pan-American Union of that city

[…] (op. cit., 102).

Later, another thousand American gold pesos were earmarked “to sculpt the bust of Duarte in marble

and have it placed in the Gallery of the National Heroes of the Pan American Union in Washington”

(op. cit., 104). Don Federico Henríquez y Carvajal refers to the “Abelardian” Duarte: “A new bust,

smaller, with softer lines, with more life, has now emerged from the creative hands of the artist. […]

I have been surprised to find in this one, features of elevation and serenity, of intense life, barely out-

lined in the other bust. There is more life in it, as well as the psychological intensity of the apostolate

and his heroism, and the new bust therefore achieves greater intellectual power. It is the Duarte of

redemption and martyrdom (op. cit., 107).

Two years later, Rodríguez Urdaneta created a clay model for

Duarte Breaking the Chains of Oppression

Proclamation of Independence

at the request of the San Pedro de Macorís City Council. In this project, Duarte

appears standing on a pedestal, in heroic proportions, while carrying in his left hand the proclamation of in-

dependence and extending his right hand in a gesture of being sworn in; an image of Liberty—identified with

the Republic—was to be situated on the lower part of the pedestal, with the broken chains of oppression in

Opening page:

Doors by sculptor

Tommaso Gismondi at

the Cathedral Basilica

of Nuestra Señora de

la Altagracia in Higüey.