QUEEN JULIANA

Statue on Julianaplein, starting point of the walking tour. (subtitle)
Juliana, April 30, 1909 – March 20, 2004, was Queen of the Netherlands from September 4, 1948 to April 30, 1980. The inauguration took place on September 6, 1948. Juliana is of great importance to Curaçao (Netherlands Antilles) because she signed the Statute, which marked the end of colonial relations within the Kingdom, in December 1954.

As a princess, she already visited Curaçao at the end of the Second World War. During the Wartime years, she stayed in Canada and London. That first visit to Curaçao took place from February 26 to March 5, 1944. A year earlier, she had already opened the airport – Princess Juliana Airport – on Sint Maarten.
At the beginning of the war, 2 days after the invasion of the Netherlands by Nazi Germany - on May 10, 1940 - Juliana fled with her family by boat to England. When Germany also threatened to invade England, she and her daughters left by boat for Canada on June 2. Her husband, Prince Bernhard, stayed behind with Queen Wilhelmina, Juliana's mother, in London. At the beginning of September 1944, Juliana returned to London at the request of her mother, but left for Canada again in January 1945. On August 2, 1945 she finally landed in the liberated Netherlands.

She was crowned Queen of the Netherlands on September 4, 1948 and visited Curaçao - for the first time as head of state - in 1955, a year after the signing of the Statute of the Kingdom. Two years later, her statue was unveiled in Curaçao, on Julianaplein, just steps away from the National Archives. In Curaçao she was portrayed as “mother of all nationals”. Juliana herself had no objection to being addressed as ma'am instead of majesty, it was even her preference. Juliana's looser style reduced the distance between the royal family and the people.

In 1955, the Island Council of Curaçao decided to design a statue of the young Queen Juliana. Much to the chagrin of Governor Teun Struycken, the commission went to the Venezuelan-Italian sculptor Renzo Bianchini. He would much rather have seen a Dutch sculptor receive such a commission. “It is probably cheaper too,” he wrote in April 1956 in a “personal p.s.” under a letter to the lieutenant governor.
A message in the Nieuwe Leidse Courant of July 26, 1956 sheds a completely different light on the origins of the image of Juliana. This indicates that this is a donation from the Venezuelan government as a tribute to the queen who meant so much to the development of Curaçao. Without further explanation, Jennifer Smit also mentions the island government of Curaçao as a 'probable client' in her overview of monuments. Venezuela's involvement is not unthinkable given the relations with the neighboring country at the time. In 1950, Prince Bernhard had made an extensive and warm friendly visit to this country, stressing its importance for the entire kingdom.

The statue that Bianchini made of Juliana is still there. The only adjustment the queen requested after seeing photos of the design was that she did not want to wear a diadem; the hair was allowed in a braid. A quote from Juliana from October 1955 is engraved on the pedestal: 'Coming together in freedom is the cornerstone of every real collaboration', which illustrates the ideals, optimism and hope of the 1950s.
The statue has also been the subject of protest over the years. In 1960 it was smeared with paint by 5 men, apparently aimed against the Constitutional Kingdom Association for which the Queen stood
as a symbol. Ten years later the statue was used again as a protest. On February 10, 1970, Amigoe reported that 'miscreants' had smeared the statue of Queen Juliana with a call to the recently appointed plenipotentiary minister Efraïn Jonckheer to return to Curaçao.

Elis Juliana
Elis Juliana, born in “Nieuw Nederland”, the city district through which this walking tour passes. (subtitle)

Elis Juliana was born on August 8, 1927 in 'Nieuw Nederland', a city district near Punda. It was the time when Shell brought migrants from all over the Caribbean to Curaçao. Radio made its debut, showbiz and club life were at their height. Confronted with the changes of modern times, the young Juliana went in search of his own identity, both his own and that of the Curaçao people. He started as a performance artist. He soon emerged as a versatile artist - poet, storyteller, draftsman, sculptor, story writer - but, inspired by his friend Paul Brenneker, he also followed the path of the researcher into his own culture. What started out of curiosity and to gain inspiration for stories and lectures grew into a passion: visiting the elderly as a source of information and knowledge. Due to their different cultural backgrounds – a Curaçaoan working-class boy and a Limburg priest – Elis Juliana and Father Paul Brenneker complemented each other excellently. Elis Juliana can boast a list of more than 50 publications, including his first poetry collection Flor di datu, his stories such as Wazo riba ròndu (1967, 1981, 1988), Guia Etnológiko I, II, III and his philosophy OPI I, II, III , IV, Organisashon Planifikashon Independensia, (1979, 1980, 1983, 1988). He passed away in 2013.

The great merit of Brenneker and Juliana's research is that they have documented the popular culture of the twentieth century in a systematic manner. They also collected many objects and compiled a unique collection of 1400 songs, music and stories. When we talk about the “Juliana-Brenneker collection”, it is divided over various heritage institutions: the National Archives Curaçao has a unique collection under that name, which represents the only decentralized plantation archive in Curaçao and is now recognized as UNESCO Memory of the World. The National Archaeological Anthropological Memory Management (NAAM) foundation manages the digital version of the Zikinza collection, mainly containing 'oral history', and the Curaçao Museum manages a collection of musical instruments under the name Juliana-Brenneker.

Father Paul Brenneker and Elis Juliana tried to study and understand the thoughts of the Curaçaoan population by collecting and documenting knowledge from the elderly. They were the main pioneers in this field in Curaçao. Paul Brenneker, a Catholic cleric of the Order of Dominicans, born on May 7, 1912 in Limburg, left behind a large cultural legacy when he died on February 7, 1996: more than a hundred publications, prints, photographs, poems, thousands of artifacts and a large collection with sound recordings of songs and stories that he had collected together with Elis Juliana from the 1950s on Curaçao, Bonaire, Aruba, Sint Maarten, Sint Eustatius and Saba. His publications such as Lekete Minawa (1958), Benta – old songs – (1959), Curaçaoensia – folklore notes about Curaçao (1961), Brua (1966), and the ten volumes Sambumbu (1969–1975) are an invaluable source of information
about for example, the development of the Guene language as a precursor to Papiamentu, about folk religion and resistance to slavery. Brenneker combined his love for local culture with charity. He did the latter specifically through the foundation for the homeless, Kas Pa nos Tur (a house for everyone), and the foundation Pan Pa mi Ruman (bread for my brothers and sisters) for people who are suffering from hunger.

Elis Juliana died on the morning of June 23, 2013 at the age of 85, just a few days after receiving the honorary doctorate title from the University of Curaçao (UoC). Elis Juliana has received many recognitions during his life. He has twice been awarded the prestigious Cola Debrot Prize, in 1973 for visual art. In 1994, a retrospective of his visual art was organized at the World Trade Center (ITC). For his 80th birthday, Gallery Alma Blou published a beautiful edition of his 'Haikus', with illustrations by José Maria Capricorne entitled 'Haiku den Lus di Animal/Haiku met Animal Voices' (2007).