Your #NationalMuseumPH continues to celebrate National Flag Days with today’s #ArtStrollSunday feature: Juan Luna’s “Bandera Filipina”, from the collection of the National Library of the Philippines. Currently on view inside the Far East Bank and Trust Company-Andres and Grace Luna de San Pedro Memorial Hall (Gallery VI) at the National Museum of Fine Arts, Luna created this painting of the Philippine flag on March 21, 1899 in Leitmeritz (Austria-Hungary, now part of Czech Republic), inscribing it as “Souvenir de 1899”. In 1899, Luna travelled to Leitmeritz together with Felipe Agoncillo, the country’ first diplomat, to visit Dr. Ferdinand Blumentritt, the Austrian historian and ethnologist who was a close friend of Dr. Jose Rizal. This watercolor, Luna’s gift to Dr. Blumentritt could be the earliest existing work of art depicting our Philippine flag. This seminal piece was made less than a year after the declaration of Philippine independence; within months, the Malolos Republic would be close to collapse under the American military advance (as illustrated in the background of the artwork), and Luna himself would be dead, succumbing to cardiac arrest in Hong Kong on December 7 as he travelled back to the archipelago on the news of his brother Antonio’s untimely death. We are open Tuesdays to Sundays from 9:00 am to 6:00 pm! For those who prefer to stay at home, here is the 360 Virtual Tour of the this gallery and eight other selected galleries at the National Museum of Fine Arts: https://www.nationalmuseum.gov.ph/nmfa360/HTML5/NMFA360.html #NMH2022 #NationalFlagDays #NationalLibraryPH ©The National Museum of the Philippines (2022)