Artpaper #23

ARCHITECTURE

The Venice Architecture Biennale 2023

INTERVIEW

The Malta Pavilion at The London Design Biennale

REVIEW Stories of Women Inspiring Change on International Women’s Day PHOTOGRAPHY An epic documentation of Valletta in Paris EXHIBITION A contemporary show of Beninese art at The Venice Biennale 2024 & A controversial exhibition Soap to Think About NEWS Non-commercial art space Unfinished Art Space celebrates its fifth birthday EVENTS in Malta and Europe ART FOR SALE A selection of fine art works

EXHIBITION

In homage of bohemian artists of 1950s in France

Gender Boss

When a disgruntled tooth fairy and a sensitive boogeyman started one of the island’s most heated discussions.

The power of art to generate discussion was experienced in Malta during the last ZiguZajg children’s art festival when even prior to the premiere of the performance work ‘Gender Boss’ conceptualised and performed by artists Romeo Roxman Gatt and Martina Georgina several key persons expressed a confused form of concern for the piece.

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DESIGN

MEMORIES OF FUTURE DESIGN

June of 2023 heralds Malta’s first participation in the relatively new London Design Biennale, an international showcase of designled innovation, contemporary creativity and research at Somerset House on the banks of the River Thames.

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MARGERITA PULÈ

JOANNA DELIA

W Welcome / Team / Inside

Editor Joanna Delia

Managing Editor

Lily Agius

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Graphic Designer Nicholas Cutajar

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Contributors

Norbert Francis Attard

Luke Azzopardi

Alexandra Aquilina

Trevor Borg

Matthew Joseph Casha

CO-MA

Alessia Deguara

Joanna Delia

Ramona Depares

Erica Giusta

Jimmy Grima

Romeo Roxman Gatt

David Pisani

Margerita Pulè

DESIGN + ARCHITECTURE

Supported by AP Valletta Architects

Babel

BAS Malta

Brands International

Bo Concept

Edwards Lowell

Heritage Malta iLab No.43

Ministry for the National Heritage, the Arts and Local Government

People & Skin

VeeGeeBee Art Supplies

Vivante Ardèche

Vivendo

Zfin Malta

Museums + Galleries

Château de Vogüé, France

Christine X Art Gallery, Malta

Design Museum, London

Green Shutters Art Space, Malta Kixott, Malta

Lily Agius Gallery, Malta

London Design Biennale

MUZA, Malta R Gallery, Malta Society of Arts, Malta

Spazju Kreattiv, Malta

Unfinished Art Space, Malta

Valletta Contemporary, Malta

Venice Biennale of Architecture

During months like these I reaffirm my mission to make the local art-scene more visible to those who remain blind to it.

Artist Norbert Francis Attard has his first solo show in a very long time at Gozo Contemporary with a satalite show called Soap to Think With at R Gallery in Tigne Street, Sliema - both unmissable! A virtual collective exhibition organised by MICAS - the Malta International Contemporary Art Space - is currently on at micas.art/digital. Jimmy Grima tells us about The School of Wind and Waves which continues to explore, navigate and document the wild habits of communities and ponders on the need for re-wilding ourselves.

Gender Boss - a performance piece conceived for this year’s Ziguzajg children’s art festival generated a nationwide discussion highlighting the power of art in its ability to gauge social

consciousness. Artpaper met up with the artists behind the work.

This edition of Artpaper also coincides with the opening of the London Design Biennale where Malta will participate for the first time with its own pavilion and a work named Urban Fabric while the Malta Society of Arts is hosting City of Art - Decadence Now, with a fine program of trans-disciplinary events. A call for artists for the first edition of The Malta Biennale next year is out and closes in August - the excitement is palpable - finally Heritage Malta’s extraordinary portfolio of buildings and spaces will host world class contemporary art. Support, discuss, watch, and get inspired! And get in touch if we’ve missed something - we know we must have!

17. VENICE Two Maltese contributions to collective exhibition in Venice

18. LONDON Interview with the team behind the Malta Pavilion at the London Design Biennale

ART NEWS

09. ARCHITECTURE The 18th International Architecture Exhibition by The Venice Biennale

09. DESIGN Malta Pavilion takes over the central courtyard of Somerset House at London Design Week

10. PHOTOGRAPHY Maltese photographer exhibits in Paris

10. BOOKS Italian author launches book at Kixott in Malta

25. WOMEN The World Press Photo Foundation and Embassy of the Netherlands launches powerful exhibition

29. ART SPACE Nomadic art space Unfinished Art Space reaches 5 years

INTERVIEWS

20. JIMMY GRIMA A desire for knowledge and learning new ideas

26. GENDER IDENTITY The Power of art to generate discussion

EXHIBITIONS

13. MALTA SOCIETY OF ART members’ exhibition

15. ALEXANDRA AQUILINA Vibrant colours and bold imagery

23. NORBERT FRANCIS ATTARD Tackling some of the most urgent and lasting events and themes of recent history

30. SCHOOL OF PARIS Artists of 1948 exhibition of work from 1950-1955 in the South of France

35. GLOBAL A selection of art events around the world

37. MALTA A selection of art events in Malta

SPOTLIGHTS

14. COVER IMAGE Exhibition featuring artefacts and salon recitals

33. REPUBLIC OF BENIN announce its debut participation at 60th Venice Biennale, 2024

38. ART FOR SALE from 2 Malta-based galleries

“Make the local art- scene more visible to those who remain blind to it.”

Joanna Delia

News / International Architecture Exhibition / Malta Pavilion

The Laboratory of the Future is an exhibition in six parts. It includes 89 participants, over half of whom are from Africa or the African Diaspora. The gender balance is 50/50, and the average age of all participants is 43, dropping to 37 in the Curator’s Special Projects, where the youngest is 24. 46% of participants count education as a form of practice, and, for the first time ever, nearly half of participants are from sole or individual practices of five people or less. Across all the parts of The Laboratory of the Future, over 70% of exhibits are by practices run by an individual or a very small team.

Central to all the projects is the primacy and potency of one tool: the imagination. It is impossible to build a better world if one cannot first imagine it. The Laboratory of the Future begins in the Central Pavilion in the Giardini, where 16 practices who represent a distilled force majeure of African and Diasporic architectural production have been gathered. It moves to the Arsenale complex, where participants in the Dangerous Liaisons section – also represented in Forte Marghera

LESLIE LOKO

LA BIENNALE DI VENEZIA The Laboratory of the Future

The 18th International Architecture Exhibition, titled The Laboratory of the Future, runs from May 20 to November 26, at the Giardini and the Arsenale, and at Forte Marghera; it is curated by Lesley Lokko and organised by La Biennale di Venezia.

in Mestre - rub shoulders with the Curator’s Special Projects, for the first time a category that is as large as the others. Threaded through and amongst the works in both venues are young African and Diasporan practitioners, our Guests from the Future, whose work engages directly with the twin themes of this exhibition, decolonisation and decarbonisation, providing a snapshot, a glimpse of future practices and ways of seeing and being in the world. (…) We have deliberately chosen to frame participants as ‘practitioners’ – and not ‘architects’ and/or ‘urbanists’, ‘designers’, ‘landscape architects’, ‘engineers’ or ‘academics’ because it is our contention that the rich, complex conditions of both Africa and a rapidly hybridising world call for a different and broader understanding of the term ‘architect’.

www.labiennale.org

Facebook: La Biennale di Venezia

Twitter: la_Biennale

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Youtube: BiennaleChannel

URBAN FABRIC

Malta Pavilion takes over the central courtyard at Somerset House for its first presentation at The London Design Biennale this June

Arts Council Malta is proud to announce ‘Urban Fabric’, by collaborative design team Open Square Collective, made up of fashion designer Luke Azzopardi, artist and academic Trevor Borg and architects Matthew Joseph Casha and Alessia Deguara. The installation will be presented at the Malta Pavilion for its inaugural participation at the London Design Biennale in 1 – 25 June 2023, responding to the biennale theme of ‘The Global Game: Remapping Collaborations’.

Conceived through a fusion of art, architecture and innovative design, Urban Fabric is a large-scale installation informed by contextual research and a deep-rooted appreciation of the need for sustainable design. The project re-contextualises the traditional Maltese village core and merges two separate elements - traditional city planning and the Phoenician-Maltese tradition of fabric production and dyeing. Thus, Urban Fabric strives to encourage discourse about the environment by presenting a well-researched, thought-provoking creative installation that combines aesthetic and spatial awareness with activism. Many of the materials from Urban Fabric will be repurposed for a new installation in Valletta in 2024. The installation will enjoy a prominent showcase during the Biennale within the central courtyard at Somerset House in London. Audiences in Malta will also be able to engage with the installation via an online portal.

The Malta Pavilion is commissioned by Arts Council Malta, under the auspices of Malta’s Ministry for the National Heritage, The Arts and Local Government. Internationalisation Executive at Arts Council Malta, Romina Delia, is the project leader of the Malta Pavilion at the London Design Biennale 2023. Urban Fabric by Open Square Collective is presented at the Malta Pavilion at the London Design Biennale, Somerset House, from 1-25 June 2023.

Read the exclusive interview with the team on page 18 >>>

https://urbanfabricmalta.com

https://londondesignbiennale.com

Padiglione Centrale Giardini. Photo by Francesco Galli

UNITED KINGDOM

THE BLACK ROSE

An epic documentation of Valletta

In 1982, photographer David Pisani embarked on a personal project to photograph the city of Valletta (Malta) and its infamous red light district of Strait Street and ‘The Gut’. What began as a photographic

essay on the city’s derelict buildings turned into an epic documentation of Valletta that spanned 29 years.

Most of the photographs in the exhibition are taken from the book Vanishing Valletta, published in 2018, a sort of Maltese equivalent of the book Paris Perdu. Thirty original prints from this series are held in the permanent collections of the Bibliothèque nationale de France. The exhibition will present an equivalent number of selenium and/ or gold-toned silver prints made by the photographer. The publication titled The Black Rose consists of a collection of anecdotes about Strait Street and The Gut and including a limited-edition print.

David Pisani’s photographic work can be summed up as a relentless pursuit of the sublime and the erotic. His earliest works (c. 1980’s) already showed a deep concern with the representation of the human body, the erotic nature of places and objects as fetishism and the

inevitable association to sexuality and death; themes which are consistently present in all his work.

The link between decay and architecture is most evident in his photographic essay on the city of Valletta and the red-light district of Strait Street entitled ‘Vanishing Valletta’ which was first exhibited in Paris in 1996 during the Biennale of photography: Mois de la Photo à Paris under the title “La Valette et le Grand Port – Portrait d’une

Capitale Maritime”. In the year 2000 a selection of the Vanishing Valletta archive was included in the permanent collections of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France. Pisani has also produced photo essays on the city of Dubai, the conflict zones in Cyprus and the city of Kyoto in Japan.

The exhibition, The Black Rose, runs until the 25th of June at the Adrian Bondy Galerie, Paris.

MALTA

NEAPOLITAN TRILOGY thoughtless tales by Giuseppe Ruffo

On May 25, 2023, the book by Italian author Giuseppe Ruffo “Trilogia Napoletana” Magmata edizioni will be launched at Kixott. Giuseppe Ruffo is an independent curator of contemporary art, founder of the Art Turm project and GR contemporary Art. He has organised exhibitions in several cities around the world including Belgrade, Berlin, Naples, New York and Seoul and has published for Tullio Pironti Editore: Una città’ Invisibile (2021).

The book is divided into three periods: The Bile of Naples, The Earthquakes, Naples Horror. “Giuseppe Ruffo’s short stories return a narrative of the city of Naples that we can translate to any other metropolis.

As the author traverses the city slowly, changing pace, he manages to capture nuances that would otherwise be lost in the frenetic, superficial pace of everyday life and forces us readers to slow down as well. In the first part of the Ruffo Trilogy he describes to us men who come from afar, dark stories. The

stories are an attempt to answer some of the questions he poses: are immigrants happy in our city ? What do they think of us ? And of Naples ?... In the second part a visceral writing, from the bottom, which returns the humus of an era, that of the post-earthquake of November 23, 1980 ... In the third part the author in a sci-fi, grotesque key tells the Naples of clichés.”

During the presentation of the book, the writer Giuseppe Ruffo is scheduled to participate with the reading of some stories, which will be accompanied by a sound environment, curated by musicians: Paolo Termini and Roberto Pugliese. Also planned is a projection of drawings in reference to the stories written by the author, by artists Raffaele Scarienzo and Salvatore Garzillo.

KIXOTT, 169, Triq il-Kbira, Mosta, Malta. https://kixott. com/events/

Credits: Cover Maiko Kikuchi; Projection drawings by Salvatore Garzillo and Raffaele Scarienzo; Soundscape Roberto Pugliese and Paolo Termini

Exhibition / The Malta Society of Arts / Members’ exhibition

RODERICK CAMILLERI

THE ARCHIVE: MEMORIES AND RECOLLECTIONS

The Malta Society of Arts’ members’ exhibition for 2023: Curated by Roderick Camilleri, the collective exhibition will be inspired by the Society’s extensive archive of seminal documents, which contain a treasure trove of knowledge, ready to be unearthed

The Malta Society of Arts’ members’ exhibition has become a highly anticipated event on the MSA’s calendar that brings together different creatives, artists, and art lovers to work on a unique collaborative project, layered with different inputs generated by teamwork and joint ventures.

Past members’ exhibitions, such as Perception in 2018, provided a vital boost of energy that supplied participants with a fresh sense of vigour and thirst for artistic research and innovation in their work. The collaborations that emerged from the process encouraged divergent artistic practices and experimentation to flourish; participants had the opportunity to explore different and unconventional processes and materials such as olfactory painting, kinetic sculpture, tactile drawing, and other unconventional methods of creation. The MSA members’ exhibition has become a special place where the members can find a sense of community within the institution through acts of cooperation and collaboration.

This year’s exhibition will follow on this idea; however its theme will be linked

to the Malta Society of Arts’ 100th anniversary at the magnificent Palazzo de La Salle, which is being celebrated with a special programme of events taking place throughout the year. The programme was designed around themes linked with history, identity, and memory – celebrating significant landmarks that characterise a centurylong story of the MSA and the arts in Malta. Most of the events forming part of the programme are rooted in or supported by the Society’s resourceful repository of knowledge, namely, its archive.

The archive has proved to be one of the most exciting starting points

for many of these projects, and the members’ exhibition was no exception. The extensive collection of documents stored at Palazzo de La Salle has provided indispensable information about past events, important information about the palace itself, and intriguing data which sheds light on the social history and the artistic context of this institution over the course of the 20th century. Moreover, the archive has been the essential source connecting the diverse elements of this multifaceted institution. The crucial aspect of the archive is that it acts as a form of matrix which generates connections through recollections and remembering.

The MSA members’ exhibition will borrow this general idea and develop it into an exhibition project. Starting from artistic research, the archival records will provide the opportunity for all the participants to develop their own take on the idea that the archive is a receptacle where recollections, identity and memory can be formulated. Some participants will probe into different modes of reminiscence and explore the phenomenon of remembering as a process of recognising or connecting. Others will explore material, tangible or intangible elements associated with the Society and its history. A few artists will use their subjective and personal memoirs to create a kind of confessional art or use elements linked with their history or memory as a source of inspiration and artistic expression.

This exhibition will involve more than 60 of the Society’s members and is curated by Roderick Camilleri. Taking place between 17 August and 7 September 2023, the exhibition will be held at the Art Galleries of Palazzo de La Salle, 219, Republic Street, Valletta. For more information, please visit www.artsmalta.org/events

MALTA

Decadence, Now

Decadence, Now explores key relationships between exponential European visual artists, musicians and writers from the Belle Epoque Period who symbiotically inspired each other’s work into visionary manifestations of beauty.

This project is one part reactionary art installation and one part concert series, aiming to argue that decadence is more than a compendium of the transgressive themes and images by which it is usually identified; a zeitgeist which has been carried on well into the twenty-first century, seeking

to reposition artefacts, reconstruct narratives and reopen artistic debates through visual, sung and spoken conversations; creating a friction and a presence that is expressed by a number of collaborators investigating a common theme.

Essentially aiming to produce a highquality and engaging programme

of events ranging from exhibitions featuring loaned artefacts from acclaimed European museums to a weekly series of salon recitals; Decadence,Now seeks to create a sustainable, research-based platform which supports collaboration and opens up possibilities for internationalisation and an open multi-cultural discourse promoting exploration and plurality.

Architect Andrew Borg Wirth, couturier and fashion historian Luke Azzopardi, pianist Lucia Micallef, soprano Gillian Zammit, and theatre director Denise Mulholland are the curators of Decadence, Now which will feature contemporary reactions from architect Michael Zerafa, poet and writer Maria Theuma, composer Karl Fiorini, Azzopardi, Borg Wirth and

Rebecca Bonaci created a series of illustrations binding the separate artefacts, themes and artworks which make up this exhibition.

performances by world class Italian tenor Raffaele Abete and German baritone André Morsch.

Decadence, Now runs from the 11th to the 31st of May at the Malta Society of Arts in Valletta. This project is supported by Art’s Council Malta’s Programme Support Grant, the Embassy of Austria, the Embassy of France, the Embassy of Germany, the Embassy of Italy, the Embassy of Spain, Istituto Italiano di Cultura, Heritage Malta, University of Malta Department of Art & Art History, University of Malta Department of English, Valletta Cultural Agency, Camilleri Paris Mode, MAPFRE Middlesea, MAVENRY, University of

Malta - Department of Art & Art history, University of Malta - Department of English, MAPFRE Middlesea, SA Consult, Von Peach, 66 St Paul’s Valletta,Transcripta, Intervisions (framers), Casa Rocca Piccola, Artemisia Fine Arts & Antiques, Express Trailers, The Malta National Archives and is under the patronage of Valeria Limentani and Jordi Goetstouwers of the Virgata Group.

For more information on Decadence, Now and to purchase your salon recital tickets visit www.cityofart.eu

SHRINE: AN UPCOMING SOLO EXHIBITION BY ALEXANDRA AQUILINA AT THE NATIONAL MUSEUM OF ART, MALTA

Alexandra Aquilina is a Maltese Berlin based pop artist whose colorful and vivacious work is a celebration of popular culture and everyday objects. Her art is a love letter to the history, folklore of Malta, where the past and the present collide in a riot of vibrant colors and bold imagery. Through techniques such as screen printing and found sculpture, Aquilina challenges the status quo in art and society with a keen sense of irony and satire. Her work is self-aware and deeply introspective, inviting viewers to reflect on the duality of nature, humanity, and spirituality.

Aquilina’s art draws on visual themes of spirituality that are distinctly Maltese and Mediterranean. The island’s rich culture and symbolism are celebrated in her work, which takes inspiration from prehistoric pagan temples, folkloristic and superstitious beliefs, Catholic art, and iconography. Her work is an exploration of the complexities of the human experience, where interpretations may vary, but are always welcomed.

At heart, Aquilina finds beauty in the grotesque and creates from a space of mental associations, solving problems that don’t exist with whatever mediums are available. Her work is drenched in carnivalesque colors, bringing her visions to life with a healthy pop culture and odd associations. Through her art, she challenges viewers to take a step back and reexamine their own spirituality and essence, to redefine it, and to create their own deities and discover their own version of solace among the chaos.

The exhibition titled Shrine, takes place at The Malta National Museum of Fine Art, Valletta. Opening 7th July, and runs until the 13th of August, Monday to Sunday 10am to 6pm.. www.screengirlmerch.com

Her art is a love letter to the history, folklore, and international mass media of Malta, where the past and the present collide in a riot of vibrant colours and bold imagery.

MALTA

A Architecture / Review / Italy

ERICA GIUSTA

PREVIEWING GHALLIS AND ISSA

In the same spirit, local architecture firm 3DM will present ISSA, an installation inviting the visitor to actively re-engage with the Maltese cultural and built heritage and aiming at rediscovering and redefining what the elements of a truly Maltese architectural identity are. “We need to experiment with our own materials and modern technology, respect the context, and come up with creations that will mirror our identity for the next 50-100 years” said Maurizio Ascione, co-founder of 3DM, at the local preview of the installation, earlier this year. The multidisciplinary team including Antonio Lorusso, Berta Calleja, Diego Acero Rangel, Kenneth Rausi, Luca Zarb, Mariel Vignoni, Matthew Farrugia, Michele Azzopardi, Paul Dalli, Luke Lee Vella Mintoff, Peter Zabek, Poppy Cambridge, Sigmund Mifsud, Wafik Nasri, Tuan Bui and Ken Chircop, hopes to “provoke an emotional reaction, a sensitive awareness” into the visitors who will be experiencing the installation.

In both cases, the eagerness to actively engage with heritage in an innovative manner highlights an important shift in focus for the local debate on heritage, identity and sustainability.

The growing interest of Maltese architecture firms in contributing to Time, Space, Existence - the satellite event of the Architecture Biennale di Venezia organised by the European Cultural Centre Italy - starting from the first participation of AP Valletta in 2014, is signalling the need for more opportunities for local architects and curators to join international platforms focusing on the debate on the built environment.

“Time, Space, Existence has given us an opportunity to be present within the far-reaching scope of this year’s Biennale. It positions us in Venice at a time when all of the world’s designers, critics and place-makers are gathering to talk and think about what will matter most as we continue to physically and intellectually build our futures”, said Ann Dingli (writer and curator) and Sandro Valentino (Valentino Architects), part of the team behind GHALLIS, which includes Sumaya Ben Saad, Matthew Farrugia, Luca Zarb and Tara Žikic, a group of students from University of Malta. In line with the curatorial statement of Lesley Lokko for the main exhibition at the Arsenale, under the title “The Laboratory of the

Future”, the team hopes to position its proposal for the adaptive reuse of the 17th century Torri tal-Ghallis as a prompt for exploration around flexible retrofit, introducing a new counter to a local cult of newbuild development.

“The premise of Lesley Lokko’s curation is a need to amplify historically hidden, overlooked or subjugated voices. In a local context, this translates to the people who want to preserve what’s good about Malta’s urban heritage, whilst propelling forward ideas that align with environmental and social longevity. Sensitive, ethical architecture is now the clear underdog in the conversation and practical evolution of Malta’s built environment. GHALLIS is an ambassador for that underrepresented voice, and a showcase of what wellmeaning, sensitive architecture can do to add value to our built fabric. This, we hope, tallies with Lokko’s call for agency, change and action” explains Ann Dingli. Their aim is to explore how historic, fortified structures like Torri tal-Ghallis might be creatively adapted, as well as their potential for becoming more accessible to wider public use. As such, the functional flexibility of new architectural elements is driven by an end-goal of inclusiveness, resisting any prescribed function. “In Malta

we are missing a discussion around how we can hybridise a solution to conserving heritage assets and allowing them to be commercially viable, whilst simultaneously recovering them for public use. We hope this will translate into a message on why heritage retrofit needs more attention and more lateral thinking, and how it could be the answer to making existing buildings more open and usable”, concludes Sandro Valentino.

Both GHALLIS and ISSA, inaugurated on the 18th of May 2023, as part of the collective exhibition Time, Space, Existence in Venice - GHALLIS at Palazzo Mora, ISSA at Palazzo Bembo. Both venues will be open to the public until 26th November 2023.

For more information and updates, visit the official website https:// timespaceexistence.com/

ERICA GIUSTA is Director of Innovation at architecture firm AP Valletta. She read for an MA in Architecture, and has a Post-Graduate Master from the Sole24Ore Business School in Milan. She contributes regularly to academic journals and international architecture magazines such as A10 New European Architecture and Il Giornale dell’Architettura.

Two Maltese contributions to Time, Space, Existence collective exhibition in Venice

GHALLIS. Photo by Joanna Demarco

ISSA. 3D Visual by 3DM Architecture

Interview /Malta Pavilion / London Design Biennale 2023

MEMORIES OF FUTURE DESIGN

June 2023 heralds Malta’s first participation in the relatively new London Design Biennale, an international showcase of design-led innovation, contemporary creativity and research at Somerset House on the banks of the Thames. Arts Council Malta has invested considerably in exporting its creative industries in recent years, with a pavilion at the Venice Biennale since 2017 and several Maltese appearances at international architecture biennials.

I meet the team responsible for the Malta’s pavilion, just a few short weeks before the set-up of their installation; the Open Square collective is made up of four creative practitioners from different fields, fitting nicely with the Biennale’s theme of The Global Game: Remapping Collaborations.

Their work, Urban Fabric, proposes a re -contextualisation of the traditional Maltese village core, combining elements of vernacular urban design with traditional fabric weaving and dyeing techniques. Wood, re-used stone and organic, sustainably-produced fabric take centre-stage in the installation which is at once structured but also soft and sail-like, placed within a large, formal Georgian square in the centre of London.

The team tells me how Open Square collective came together. Lead creative artist Matthew Joseph Casha and architect Alessia Deguara presented the element of spatial planning and an immersive space. Trevor Borg is an artist and academic, and an established figure in Malta’s contemporary art scene. It was important for the project to have an awareness of the environment, both in terms of the space around it, and in terms of its impact on the earth’s resources. And with couturier and designer Luke Azzopardi on board, the team of four was complete; he brought with him his interest in the specialised techniques of the ancient Phoenicians who for millennia lived, produced and traded in the Mediterranean. The team were inspired by the Phoenicians’ weaving and dyeing techniques in particular, as well as the ingenuity of their use of resources. This ethos; careful attention to detail and an awareness of the fragility of our ecosystems is present throughout the project – in how its materials are sourced and treated, and the plans for their re-use once the project has finished.

Ultimately, the team has produced a design that is both minimalist and luxurious; where raw materiality takes centre stage, but where design is refined and subtle. The structure’s materials speak with their own voice - materials are left natural and almost untreated; nothing is disguised or hidden. As we speak, it becomes apparent how important a genuine respect for the integrity of the materials is to the team, and consequently, the treatment of these materials. The integral nature of the design is understated, and yet behind it was an ambitious undertaking, with untreated wood, meticulous dyeing processes, and materials that can be disassembled & reused, including working with wood sections left at a length that is still acceptable for re-use after this project’s life-span.

The artists tell me they were aiming for the evocation of a sense of memory as well as space within the installation, and indeed their concept seems to draw diverse periods of history and memories together; the Phoenician era, much later centuries when Maltese villages began to mushroom around the island, the Georgian period in Britain, and contemporary times during this century flow around each other through the fluid streets of the installation.

During the final preparations for Malta’s participation in the London Design Biennale, we meet the team behind the concept and actualisation, to hear about their intention behind the design.

Computer generated render of the Malta Pavilion at Somerset House for The London Design Biennale 2023

And during its time in the square, the installation will create its own histories and narratives; natural colours may fade, timbers may shift, and fabrics may billow and float – this is part of the life-cycle of the natural materials it contains. Visitors will wander through it and create their own experiences, which will change with the weather and time of day. It is this cyclical, temporal quality which is intrinsic to natural materials and processes that the Urban Fabric project is quietly advocating for.

The village core from which the project takes its inspiration is not immediately recognisable in the project’s design. But its conceptualisation is present in its seemingly haphazard layout and its narrow, limestone streets, radiating from the focal-point of the village square and evolving over centuries. What were once thick, immoveable, yellow ochre walls have been transformed into almost its visual opposite; rich purples, vibrating on floating vertical fabrics, on a light and permeable frame. The only trace of the vernacular urban planning of the Mediterranean is its maze-like layout which gently leads the visitor along its streets and towards its centre.

Take a step back, and the contrast with the surrounding environment becomes clear. The Georgian square of Somerset House, itself steeped in British cultural history and characterised by symmetry, balance and proportion has become home to a fluid, almost breathing structure. But there exist other contrasts in this design exercise; a

battle of architectures, and a subversion of hierarchies. The vernacular architecture of southern Europe, with its connotations of sun-soaked walls and Mediterranean living has shifted northwards. Its fluid and floating aesthetic and its temporality contrast with the solid walls which surround it, and their grandiosity and permanence. It inserts a chink – of light, of air, of mutability – that may come to represent something more in future times. The design contains a subversive element – whether intended or not - sneaking a village ‘pjazza’ into a square of palatial grandeur: interrupting its symmetry and poise with irregular pathways and billowing sails. The decolonial act lends importance to vernacular and organic urban planning, and places it on a world stage.

MARGERITA PULÈ is an artist, writer and curator, with a Master’s Degree in Fine Arts, and founder of Unfinished Art Space. Her practice and research are concerned with the contradictions of politics and social realities.

The installation proposes a collaboration with its surroundings, with the architecture around it, with the sprawling city of London and with the visitors who walk through it. But it also offers a conversation with the natural elements that it will face; the wind that will buffet it sails, the sun that will lighten its colours, and the rain that will, no doubt, soak it quite thoroughly. It lays down a challenge too, to the ugly concrete structures that have mushroomed in Malta over the past decades, all but obliterating its more dignified indigenous architecture.

We also talk about the technology that is employed in the piece; the heatmapping tools that will reflect visitors’ movement within the space - that ebb and flow of people which any public

space experiences as the day progresses. As in a village square, visitors may pass by slowly or quickly, may spend hours lingering, or may arrange to meet friends alongside it. Their movements will change the character of the space, and the light and colour within it.

Ultimately, good design is thoughtful, intuitive and sensitive; if it has a point to make, it doesn’t force that point home. This project has been conceived with a quiet certainty, one that allows it a feeling of fluidity and intimacy within an environment of grandeur.

The fourth edition of the London Design Biennale will take place from 1 to 25 June 2023 at Somerset House, London. The Malta Pavilion “Urban Fabric” by Open Square Collective, is commissioned by Arts Council Malta under the auspices of Malta’s Ministry for the National Heritage, the Arts and Local Government.

Open Square Collective, is an art and design collective by creative lead Matthew Joseph Casha, fashion designer Luke Azzopardi, artist Trevor Borg, and architect Alessia Deguara, supported by Ramona Depares and Gilbert Micallef.

Internationalisation Executive at Arts Council Malta, Dr Romina Delia, is project-leading Malta’s participation at the London Design Biennale 2023.

Courtyard South Elevation Model, ACAD. Matthew Casha

Open Square Collective. From left: Alessia Deguara, Luke Azzopardi, Matthew Joseph Casha, Trevor Borg and Ramona Depares. Photo by Sebio Aquilina

“This project has been conceived with a quiet certainty, one that allows it a feeling of fluidity and intimacy within an environment of grandeur.”

Feature /Jimmy Grima / The School of Wind and Waves

DR JOANNA DELIA

THE SCHOOL OF WIND AND WAVES

Jimmy Grima has proven himself as a master of transcribing the intricacies of complex and sometimes unpalatable habits and hobbies of his birth country into stunning visual and performance art. In parallel to his practice with performance art pieces receiving great reviews and awards he is part of the team behind The School of Wind and Waves.

Malta to collect knowledge of the winds as part of the Valletta 2018 Cultural Programme. A tangible outcome of this research can be located within the limits of these four localities.

This led to the creation of this framework that makes space for the idea of listening, re-learning, and unlearning with teachers who are hardly found in any other school; within this framework, community members become such teachers.

of natural elements while referring to knowledge transfer.

JD: What fascinates you about the concept of ‘rewilding’ people?

JD: What is the School Of Wind and Waves?

JG: The School is a space for epistemic curiosity—a desire for knowledge, for learning new ideas while eliminating information gaps. Primarily the goal is to collect and create repositories while disseminating specific ecologies’ cultural and technological lore. At the School, we aim to be attentive to various individual and collective practices considered marginal about the mainstream culture and its discourse. Such practices offer

unique forms of (often embodied) knowledge about the land, water, and ecosystems of particular locations while being inextricable from a specific place’s cultural traditions and memory.

The School of Winds and Waves is a newly established initiative I have thought about for a long time—after ilWarda tar-Rih (the Windrose Project). Around 2015 I led the rubberbodies collective and various collaborators and members of four communities in

This is the short version of how The School of Winds and Waves came to be. It must also have been some ghosts from the past project who have haunted me for the past decade with an obsession to transfer the things they knew. Some of these people have died since we interviewed them. One ghost would be that of Lino Psaila (19432017), kite master and author of a book in Maltese about heroes and tragedies of the micro-community of fishermen in Marsaxlokk “Il-Bahar Rasu Iebsa” (English title can be translated as “The Sea is Hardheaded”, which is a Maltese proverb).

JD: Where did the name come from?

JG: The name came about while musing with my collaborators. I appreciate that it holds both the intangible qualities

JG: At first, I did not know we were tapping into the idea of rewilding. What was essential was to document and find ways to disseminate marginal knowledge. We explicitly use the term “rewilding” for the online short guides because of their intersection with the topic. The idea to publish short but detailed accounts of how to trap animals has its roots in my ongoing collaboration with the bird trappers of Malta.

This micro-community is why I decided that a school, in the sense of re-learning or unlearning certain things about our environment, is essential.

Why? Because these people hold a knowledge that seldom finds space in books, their cultural, technological and sometimes artistic qualities are a critical aspect of culture and identity that needs to be recorded since the practices are on the verge of extinction. In the past, such knowledge was passed over from one generation to the other orally. However, today this way of knowledge transfer needs to be recovered since there is a lot of social mobility. In this sense, if you speak to a fisherman in his

The kinetic sculpture at Exiles in Sliema, Malta, as part of the il-Warda tar-Rih (the Windrose Project).

Photo by © Tümer Gençtürk

Water workers in Terschelling. Photo by © Jimmy Grima

JOANNA DELIA is a medical doctor who specialises in cosmetic medicine. She is also a cultural consumer and art collector who tirelessly supports local contemporary art and culture.

sixties today, there is a high possibility that his father was also a fisherman and his grandfather.

However, simultaneously, there is a strong chance that his children are no longer fishermen. So the intergenerational orally transmitted lore is now in danger. Today, practices related to how we used to interact with nature have been gradually pushed out to accommodate a much more efficient way of doing things since the invention of the combustion engine to today’s revolution in robotics and automation. Most people have distanced themselves from the natural environment.

I also want to mention the preservationist view, conservationists, and people that engage with nature in a way that opposes them to such practices as birdtrapping. My position and invitation are to think beyond the dualistic divide while acknowledging the complexity of the current ecological catastrophe; I believe that marginal practices possess an essential value and must be viewed beyond the “barbarism-enlightenment” lens that is most definitely a remnant of colonial times. I welcome making space for complexity and pluralism to build a mutually respectful society.

When you look at Malta, such observations are more sharply visible. However, zooming out of Malta, since I have spent plenty of time in the Netherlands, other vital issues come into play. Here my attention turned towards the labour movement, the workforce and what knowledge these people hold regarding dealing with Water. How do those who have dedicated their lives to working with water relate to it? What are their sensitivities?

Technological development brought people in high-income economies to a comfortable standard of living, lives became efficient yet also somewhat sterile. And at the same, people grew distant to understanding of essential attributes that sustain life, such as the sourcing of food at large, the way we look and interact with nature; distantly – through binoculars or, even more radical, from the comfort of our living room through an LED screen.

I have a strong background in theatre, so I see another value in this knowledge. In theatre, we often speak about embodiment. I observed this when collaborating with the bird trappers or when I saw the fireworks masters at work; I noticed that the only way to “catch” their wisdom is to spend time with those who engage in these practices.

JD: Your work deals with several traditional practices which communities seem to be trying to root out - firework bomb building, hunting and trapping for pleasure, but also navigating the roots and social ramifications of these ‘delizzji’. Is The School an extension of these projects? Is it providing a less transient platform for the documentation of your research?

JG: The School focuses on nonmainstream practices. And yes, I am trying to organize and set up a community of contributors for posterity’s sake. The practices we are interested in are those relating to the passing of time, leisure and hobbies and, on the other hand, those relating to labour and skills. And as the name implies, practices that interact or relate to nature. There is something unique around the proximity towards nature and how deeply embedded this natural world is within these men (because it is usually always men).

Working closely with the traditional practices, as you named them in your questions, often reveals spaces or blindspots which are unique and essential for the culture. And we are in danger of losing access to this heritage altogether. I hold the post-war modernity and the neoliberal values of efficiency for the sake of economic values responsible for this imminent loss.

There is an ongoing resurfacing concept of pleasure, hobbies and the amateur. While exploring some of these practices, the traditional ones, more

than any, have a vital element of noncommerciality. Of spending time doing what you love to do rather than having to do it because it’s professional duty. I found it very enriching to get to know this subject in more depth while reading “The Amateur: The Pleasures of Doing What You Love” by Andy Merrifield. For example, non-professional experts have shaped societies in the past, such as rebuilding whole cities post-war; they often led cities, communities and inventions. If you look deeper into who was behind these revolutionary human efforts, you will not find professional urban planners commissioned by governments to rethink and gentrify city areas.

But ordinary people who, after work, met, united and came together to rebuild their societies. The school wants to look into all the practices which relate to this. However, the spirit is very much in line with searching for those doing it for the love of doing it. “L’amor propio”. In the case of the Maltese bird-trappers and their claim of loving nature and birds or how firework masters spend their time collectively rolling paper and filling it with gunpowder for months. All of the time spent is not paid for. It is voluntary. Such practice relating to the natural world with no capitalistic value seems to have dropped out of the canon and mainstream voices on ecology. The school sees these amateurs as masters and seeks to learn things from their attitude towards life.

On the other hand, we are also interested in the knowledge of labourers, the workers. For example, the stratum of

Jimmy Grima dissected a firework during the live performance of Kaxxa: Infernali: Explosions after learning the technique from Maltese firework masters.

Photo by © Jimmy Grima

A photo from archival materials relating to water workers in the Netherlands in the 1960s.

Photos by © National Archives, Netherlands

Feature /Jimmy Grima / The School of Wind and Waves

Expeditie programme at the festival Oerol.

Later in July, we will visit Amsterdam hosted by the festival Over het Ij. There the School is looking for workers managing man-made rivers and city canals. Amsterdam has a very long history of man-made canalisation.

In Amsterdam, the School will ask the invited speakers to bring a tool and a water sample from their workplace, and a small audience will be invited to visit the site and attend the live events. After tuning into the specified FM frequency, the audience can listen to the live interviews while exploring the area overlooking the man-made river Ij which connects Amsterdam to the North Sea through the Noordzeekanaal.

JD: What is the future of The School? Where do you intend to take it?

JG: Over the following months, The School has two main trajectories. Firstly it will continue the exploration through the aforementioned guides.

Guides Covers

society, the workforce behind water management, is another source of embodied and epistemic expertise we would like to collect and preserve.

JD: What themes is The School researching, documenting and working on now? Where can we see the work?

JG : The School is publishing a series of short guides on trapping practices with V/A, an online magazine initiated by the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia. For now, the series consists of the traps of lizards, songbirds part 1 and part 2 and wild rabbits. The starting point for this series was some of the old-time practices I experienced as a child and almost forgot along the way. Through these series, I capture the essentials and some tips for tricks. The idea is to be introduced to a different way of relating with nature in terms of proximity, to go out there and engage instead of simply reading about it.

At the School, we started a project collecting recordings of conversations with water workers to create a repository of their views and sensitivities towards this wet element. The idea is to travel

and pick up specific water management topics related to the geographic areas we visit. For example, in June, the School will travel to Terschelling, an island in the North Sea of the Netherlands, to unpack “Drinking Water”. The island stands on top of a freshwater bubble in the North Sea, providing half of the island. The rest is connected through a pipeline from the mainland. We will present our discoveries as part of the

Secondly, it will focus on nonmainstream knowledge about water and aqueous ecologies in the Netherlands, starting with listening to workers whose livelihoods are fundamentally shaped by this element.

The School of Winds and Waves aspires to grow into a multilingual project and to create a community of contributors visiting and working in different geographic areas.

In exploring Water, we are particularly interested in visiting and working on Islands, which are isolated and marginalized geographically. And port,

river and lake cities because of their complex relationship between urban development and the natural habitat.

The School can organise classes/ expeditions/outings around these topics for adults and younger audiences to learn things that do not belong to the curriculum. It will be an invitation to look beyond the digital two-dimensional world confined to acclimatized spaces inside, get out there, and directly engage with the natural environment.

Finally, here is a list of relevant bibliographic conclusions to this interview in case the readers want to engage with the subject further.

Explosive Histories, my essay on firework masters in Malta published on various artists by Pro Helvetia, ilBahar Rasu Iebsa by Lino Psaila, Birds of Passage: Hunting and Conservation in Malta by Mark Anthony Falzon, How Did We Get Into This Mess?: Politics, Equality, Nature by George Monbiot, The Amateur: The Pleasures of Doing What You Love by Andy Merrifield, Hot Money by Naomi Klein , All Art is Ecological by Timothy Morton, and We Belong to Gaia by James Lovelock.

Michael Grima explained the technology of the song-bird-trap during the Song of a Bird research.

Photo by © Jimmy Grima

School of Winds and Waves in Different Languages

SOAP THINK WITH TO

A solo exhibition by Norbert Francis Attard

Contemporary Maltese artist, Norbert Francis Attard opened his solo exhibition titled SOAP TO THINK WITH at Gozo

Contemporary on the 1st of April, followed by a satellite exhibition at R Gallery in Sliema, Malta, on the 20th of April

The exhibition, which is curated by Ann Dingli, chronicles the artworks and subject-matter of a comprehensive solo exhibition by the artist, encompassing a breadth of multi-media work spanning just over two and a half years in the making. The show’s works and catalogue will interrogate three driving themes: the Covid-19 pandemic; political and financial corruption in Malta; and the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.

Attard’s treatment of these themes begins from a universal and global perspective, threads through spheres of collective thought, and finally zones into individual analysis. Each theme is catechised through works that link with canons of conceptual art, objet trouvé, light art, photography, sculpture, and graphic art. In his selection of subjectmatter, Attard builds a retrospective comment around the wider and ongoing

question of human ethics – his work grapples with the major traumas and moral dilemmas that have plagued communities both worldwide and locally in Malta. Their commentary addresses events that occurred over substantial stretches of time, as well as those that took place within the space of a moment.

The works comprising SOAP TO THINK WITH tackle some of the most urgent, lasting events and themes of recent history, together acting as a contemplative edict on how human beings live today. They accordingly function as a capsule of reflection for Malta and beyond – a longform comment on the way humanity contends with the most arduous tests and trials of our time.

SOAP TO THINK WITH includes 111 pieces in total, the vast majority of which are featured in this exhibition. All of the exhibition’s works were conceived and made during the Covid-19 period and immediately after The World Health Organization declared the virus a pandemic on 11th March 2020. National lockdowns began two days later, on 13th March. The exhibition’s first pieces were created towards the end of March 2020, followed by an entire series of 2D and 3D works that continued to be

ANN DINGLI is an art and design writer with an MA in Design Criticism from the University of the Arts, London. She has worked as a freelance writer and content consultant for four years, writing remotely from London, New York and Malta since 2016. (anndingli.com)

produced until the end of October 2022 – a span of exactly thirty-one months. In numerology, which is the belief that numbers share a mystical relationship between coinciding events, the number 111 is closely linked to new beginnings, independence and positivity. When added together, 111 equals 3, which symbolises creativity, curiosity and imagination. These are all attributes which have come to define Attard’s decades-long artistic career, in which he strays away from stagnation, and instead seeks out the new, reinventing

himself at every opportunity which presents itself.

SOAP TO THINK WITH is a satellite exhibition of Valletta Contemporary, at Gozo Contemporary, 11 Triq Mongur, Gharb, Gozo, until the 29th of October 2023. And R Gallery in Sliema presents part of the collection in a solo show until the 3rd of June, curated by Julien Vinet.

www.vallettacontemporary.com/ soap-to-think-with

Exhibtion /Exhibition / Norbert Francis Attard

MALTA

Works by by Norbert Francis Attard at R Gallery, Sliema until 3 June

ANN DINGLI

Review /International Women’s Day

On International Women’s Day, the 8th of March 2023, the Embassy of the Netherlands and the World Press Photo Foundation launched ‘ResilienceStories of Women Inspiring Change’ at at Laparelli Gardens, Valletta Ditch.

The exhibition showcased a selection of stories, awarded in the World Press Photo Contests from 2000 to 2021, that highlight the resilience and challenges of women and girls around the world. The powerful and poignant images were sometimes accompanied by audiointerviews done with the photographers who captured the stories of courage and adaptability of women in near desperate situations.

At the opening reception, keynote speaker Renee Laiviera, Commissioner and Acting Executive Director of the National Commission for the Promotion of Equality, speaking about Antonella from Argentina, one of the subjects of the photos, said “She was ready to give up her most important asset as a young girl. She realised that although she loved her long hair so much, her education

WOMEN = RESILIENCE

was more important to her. And that is a very strong message for our young girls as well, who often don’t appreciate their opportunities.”

In a country, Malta where 30% less teens are signing up for and doing O’levels as compared to 10 years ago, this resounds

loudly. Especially with girls who have overwhelmingly chosen to study less science subjects at an early age favoring instead subjects such as hairdressing and care-work which is being offered in the hope that the aging population will find local workers to fill up gaps in care homes. The opportunity to further one’s

studies is being flushed down the drain because of the ease to find work with the civil service, and the valuing of income above the respect for knowledge while most persons in developing countries would do anything for the opportunity to acquire an education.

Speaking about the series of photos Finding Freedom in the Water, Sweden’s Ambassador to Malta, Andrés Jato, said “It is remarkable in a sense that these women live on an island surrounded by the sea and beach and are not able to swim. It is the total opposite of empowerment in a sense.” He also highlighted the progress that these images represent: “you can see change going on, these women are learning how to swim, and they are taught by women. It is change for women by women.”

Ambassador of the Netherlands to Malta, Djoeke Adimi-Koekkoek, spoke about the dire situation in Yemen, depicted at the exhibition by Fatima who is fishing, traditionally a male occupation. “I have lived in Yemen for almost 13 years and the people of Yemen are so close to my heart. I have seen it, there is so much poverty and suffering by women in Yemen. On the index of where you have the worst chance of success born being a girl, Yemen has been listed as the worst country in the world in 2019.”

The World Press Photo Foundation is based in Amsterdam and was founded in 1955. It remains one of the most influential bodies when it comes to largely uncensored photographic material - with images that have changed the course of history. The exhibition succeeded in increasing the visibility of women in conflict zones and visually emphasises their role in conflict resolution and survival.

Photos by Dragana Rankovic

DR JOANNA DELIA

DR JOANNA DELIA

Gender Boss

In a speech sarcastically called ‘Why have there been no great transgender artists’ Jeannine Tong says:

‘Many of us credit these artists with producing great art. I certainly do. And while I don’t doubt artists with complex gender identifications have produced art since the idea was imaginable, within EuroAmerican modernism the breadth of this recognition is rare. I cite this litany of critics, curators, spaces, and schools to emphasize how greatness emerges through advocacy that is utterly social, situated and spatial.’

The power of art to generate discussion was experienced in Malta during the last ZiguZajg children’s art festival when even prior to the premiere of the performance work ‘Gender Boss’ conceptualised and performed by artists Romeo Roxman Gatt and Martina Georgina several key persons expressed a confused form of concern for the piece.

Ranging from MPs questioning the artists’ ‘abilities’/‘agency’ in parliament when they had not even read the script, insinuating that if one invites children to explore a very real issue through art they are confusing them to a raging discussion on social media, few actually stopped to ask what the work was really about.

I caught up with the artists to discuss the work.

JD: Artists communicate with society through their art. What did you want to communicate when approached to create this work?

RRG/MG: Our main intention from the very start of this project was to create a work that focuses on gender identity and expression, embraces gender diversity and challenges gender stereotypes. We wanted to create a performance that speaks of love as well as embraces differences. As for the workshop we wanted to create a safe space and give agency to children to create their own characters that go on their own journey of self discovery.

JD: What was the process which led to this creation?

RRG/MG: From early on in the process we understood the responsibility we had when asked to create a children’s performance that would centre on gender, especially since it isn’t often the central focus in children’s stories and yet gender most often still forms part of such stories. We understood the complexity of the subject being dealt with within our work and our focus was to address it in a way that would be accessible to children and would give them the ability to engage with it. Our starting point therefore was looking into content that children of that age are already familiar with. We started looking into fairytales, cartoons, films and toys of the target age group. All of this material inspired us to imagine some of these characters wanting to go beyond their often more stereotyped gender roles and behaviours.

JD: The work involves visual props, sound and performance as well as an interactive workshop. Can you elaborate on the various elements which make up this work?

RRG/MG: We wanted to create work that would not only be already familiar to children, but would also be work that is true to our own practice. Performance is an important element in both our work and this is often communicated through multiple mediums including movement, text, sound, video and sculpture. We were intuitively inspired to create a children’s-bedroom-like world as we saw this as the birthplace of endless imagination and where dreams come to life. We later referred to this world as ‘The Land’ which would offer a safe space for our characters to travel to and thus became the set of our performance. We became more and more inspired by ‘The Land’ being a place where our later characters would feel safe to be themselves. We delved into the world of transformations, metamorphosis and shapeshifting that is already found in many children’s content and even created a video work with an edited compilation taken from already existing footage of transformations visible in cartoons and film as well as transformations that happen within the animal kingdom.

We mostly continued working with existing materials. ‘The Land’ was filled with toys and characters which we transformed into other beings, some human, some less human, others animal or a combination of both to emphasise a more fantastical-land. Though ‘The Land’ had an

Photos by Niels Plotard and Spazju Kreattiv

When a disgruntled tooth fairy and a sensitive boogeyman started one of the island’s most heated discussions.

overall punk-like aesthetic we imagined ‘The Land’ to be the ideal world where love would conquer over hate and judgement. A tooth fairy, Toothy, and a boogeyman Boogey were our main characters. ‘The Land’ offered the not so dainty and graceful Toothy the chance to explore her inner superhero and offered the not so scary Boogey a chance to make his first friend. Aunty Turbo, Toothy’s aunt had earlier become a resident at ‘The Land’ Toothy and Boogey travelled to and was a source of inspiration for both characters to accept themselves for wanting to go beyond their fairytale norms.

JD: How did you come about naming this performance?

RRG/MG: The title was inspired by a book we referred to in our initial research titled “Gender Explorers” by Juno Roche. It is a collection of life-affirming interviews focusing on the stories of young gender diverse and trans people who share their empowering experiences of questioning and exploring gender.

‘I believe that children who are questioning and exploring their gender, or simply making gender do what they need it to do in order that they can lead happy, functional and aspirational lives, are the future of this planet. They are the gender explorers and gender bosses that we all so desperately need. Yes, I feel as strongly as that: I believe that they are our future.’ – Gender Explorers, Juno Roche

JD: As multidisciplinary artists with a repertoire of performance pieces, you recognized the need to produce a work of art tailored for a young audience. How was this different from performance works you have made before?

RRG/MG: Although this has been our first collaboration together, we have both dealt with subjects centering around gender amongst other thematics that are often associated with an adult audience. However we also have had experience working with children before, both on other artistic projects and also in schools. Our ongoing discussions have made us realise even more how important it is to expose children to topics that are often deemed complicated or “confusing”.

We are very aware that these assumptions tend to be counterproductive as they not only continue to solidify stereotypes but also end up excluding portions of the population that could potentially have a great effect on the way our future will evolve; one that is a more inclusive and diverse place.

So of course it was crucial for us to take on this project and talk about gender in a way that is accessible and playful for a young audience. As artists, researchers and thinkers we have the power to talk about pressing political issues in a way that can include, involve and be more accessible to all.

JD: In your process do you regularly consider the discussion your work generates? Do you think there s a work of art in Malta which generated as much discussion? Is the reaction to a work by the community the most valuable aspect of a work of art?

RRG/MG: There is a place for all kinds of art, but for us personally, the work that we are inclined to create desires the need to communicate and pose questions that might often seem uncomfortable, or not so easy to talk about and this instantly opens up a space for discussion. This work in particular generated attention that wasn’t necessarily the one we were interested in partaking in, especially when the discussions being held around it were prior to the work ever being shown. We quickly realised that since we were not completely able to enter such heated discussions that did not feel safe, we understood we had a responsibility to our approaching audiences and could only engage once the work would have been seen. We always believed that this work was really important for us to make, however it was only post-project that we realised how a work like this is necessary.

The children and adults who did come to see the performance as well as take part in the workshop, generously shared with us how such a work needs to exist especially amidst all the prejudice that was experienced prior. It is important to continue to follow up on these discussions and to know that this kind of work makes visible as well as gives a little hope to those who are often left in the dark, alone and lost.

JD: The audience this work was meant for responded by creating characters, drawings, and continued thinking about the work from home as evidenced by the thoughts

they wrote on the workbooks you handed out. Do you see this as an elaboration of the work? Many contemporary art pieces today are about documenting the process and narrative. A performance art work with an open ended invitation to the audience to continue thinking, writing, drawing and documenting enriches the piece. Do you agree?

RRG/MG: At a later stage in our production period we came up with this idea where the floor of our performance space would be covered in a white sheet. Every time we performed we drew our transformed character on this sheet. This excited us in thinking that our audiences could also contribute their own drawings within the set, and hence become a part of the work themselves. This is when we came up with the idea of inviting the kids to draw their own creatures on this sheet. In the end we ended up with a large drawing filled with creatures that the kids would have created in their workbook during the workshop. This compilation of drawings became a collective artwork which feels less individual and more communal and that is also something that felt quite fitting to this particular work especially since the children’s involvement, ideas and agency were central to us and the work.

JD: What’s next? Will the work be touring? Do you think the invitation should be for people of all ages?

RRG/MG: We would like it to tour and to be experienced by more audiences for sure. We feel that many people, specifically children, unfortunately missed out on the chance of seeing Gender Boss due to the controversy that preceded the performance. We hope that there will be other opportunities for us to deliver this work, and hopefully this time it will be welcomed with a more open and less judgemental mindset.

MARGERITA

Unfinished Business

SINCE THE SPARK OF AN IDEA JUST FIVE YEARS AGO, UNFINISHED ART SPACE HAS MATURED INTO A RESPECTED CONTRIBUTOR TO MALTA’S VISUAL ARTS SCENE. AS UNFINISHED CELEBRATES ITS FIFTH BIRTHDAY, FOUNDER MARGERITA PULÈ WRITES ABOUT HOW THE ORGANISATION STARTED, WHAT IT HAS ACHIEVED TILL NOW, AND ITS PLANS FOR THE NEXT FIVE YEARS.

Unfinished Art Space is one of the few independent noncommercial art spaces in Malta. Alongside more established small organisations such as The Mill in Birkirkara, or Studio Solipsis in Rabat, we operate on a tight budget, sometimes working from project to project, but always supporting and exhibiting artists and their work. Independent art spaces have had a potted history in Malta from the now legendary MCA in Marsa, to the ingenious itinerant programme of Fragmenta Malta, but not all have stood the test of timefor various contextual and practical reasons. Unfinished Art Space was borne out of this environment, out of a need for a flexible and open space, one that champions contemporary, experimental and research-based practices, while also providing a supportive context within which to work.

One important characteristic of Unfinished is that we, and our programme are nomadic and fluid. We have produced work with and within national institutions, but we also work

in far less conventional spaces, such as a disused building, in public space, or in an online environment. Our first collaboration is still one of my favourites; with Parking Street Events, we recreated Il-Kamra ta’ Barra in Sliema beside a huge construction site that had been a blight on the neighbourhood for years. Recreating the atmosphere of respectability and elegance in the street, literally bringing the kamra (room) barra (outside), complete with old clock, chintzy furniture and landscapes, we invited passers-by and neighbours to drink a cup of tea with us on our sofa, and tell us about their concerns for the neighbourhood. Thus, Unfinished Art Space was born, often proposing a critical or political position, with commentary on feminist and postcolonial questions, working with artists to research and question these areas.

Our early initiatives were mostly impromptu affairs, produced with friends and well-wishers. In 2020, in a small break in the clouds of covidlockdown, we put on probably our most quickly-produced exhibition to date. Multi-disciplinary artist Charlene Galea had amassed hundreds of photographs

of clubbing scenes, from her travels around Europe, from London and Ibiza, to Morocco and Romania. At a time when clubs all over Europe were closed, images of the exhilaration, intimacy and beauty of these dance scenes, along with music by Tina Camilleri brought a club-like queue to the door of the empty house we had commandeered for the project.

But in a short space of time, our projects gradually became more ambitious. Our two feminist shows, which coincided in 2020 and 2022 with International Women’s Day (both funded through Arts Council Malta schemes) allowed us to collaborate more widely and invite international artists to work with us. Memorable events include Romeo Roxmann Gatt and dancers performing My Womxn is a God My God is a Womxn in MUZA’s community space (part of Strangers in a Strange Land), Syowia Kyambi travelling from Kenya to install and perform her hard-hitting Kaspale’s Playground, and, in the wind and rain of an early January morning, Edith Dekyndt on a cherry-picker in Valletta’s Independence Square, filming the statue of Queen Victoria for her short film Nursery Crime (part of The Ordinary Lives of Women, co-curated with Elise Billiard Pisani).

We have also worked on some longerterm collaborative research projects that have served to build small communities – of artists, performers, and thinkers. Debatable Land(s) proposed a body of research working towards negotiation and decision-making, taking Malta as a case study for ideas around belonging, borderlines and territorial actions (a collaboration with Fleeting Territories and Greta Muscat Azzopardi). We showed this research in Vienna, as an experimental research-project, and later hosted a three-day festival in Kalkara continuing our research exploring how territories and lands are formed, and what conflicting interests influence these formations. Over the course of a weekend, the house was filled with sound-pieces, video-work, installations, performances and conversations, bringing our community – that had begun online – together.

The coming few years are all about international collaborations. In early 2024, we will be working in Barcelona with curators Alexia Medici and Pilar Cruz and a number of Maltese and Catalan artists on a site-specific exhibition Mater

And as time has gone by, we have also become more ambitious in sourcing funding, and are now partners in two Creative Europe projects - something which we were told was practically impossible for such a small organisation. We are already working on Figure It Out; the Art of Living Through System Failure with a number of European collaborators and led by the Croatian collective Drugo More, which will see a number of events during 2024 in Malta and around Europe.

The second of our Creative Europe projects, the Magic Carpets platform (led by Kaunas Biennale, and in Malta in collaboration with Istanbul-based Diyalog), has allowed us to invite curator Elyse Tonna to work with Maltese and Europe-based artists on a series of sitespecific multi-disciplinary interventions creating dialogue in relation to ecological thinking, speculative futures, and non-human communities.

Lastly, and another favourite of mine; in 2031, a Maltese city or region will again hold the title of European Capital of Culture – with an every-growing team of collaborators and participants, we are spearheading Farfara 2031 and preparing Farfara’s bid for the ECoC title.

Longer-term, we will continue to collaborate and research. We will also continue to support artists, colleagues and the creative sector in general, working towards an environment where more importance is given to contemporary art and artists. The name Unfinished Art Space refers to the process of the creative act; always evolving and never quite finished –we hope that we will keep evolving, developing, experimenting and being ‘unfinished’ for many more years to come.

Syowia Kyambi. Kaspale’s Playground (2022) within The Ordinary Lives of Women, co-curated with Elise Billiard Pisani at Spazju Kreattiv. Photo by Lindsey Bahia

REA (Rachelle Deguara), Tort ta’ min? (2021) within Debatable Land(s), co-curated with Fleeting Territories and Greta Muscat Azzopardi. Photo by Elisa von Brockdorff

Exhibtion /France / D’Alba-La-Romaine

ARTISTS OF Alba-La-Romaine

1950 - 1955

It was in 1948 that the artists of the School of Paris discovered in the newspaper Combat a call from the painter and theoretician André Lhote calling for artists and intellectuals to come and settle in the ruined houses of Alba-la-Romaine in the South of France: “What is an artist, the intellectual with one or two dozen surplus banknotes in the bottom of a drawer, who will recoil before the intoxicating work to be accomplished: saving a beautiful old house, miraculously surviving from war and universal contempt.”

The response was immediate, and from 1949 painters, sculptors, engravers and ceramists of all nationalities flocked to Alba-la-Romaine. French, English, Colombians, Chileans, Hungarians, Spanish, Americans, Dutch, and Swedish, fleeing the traumatic memory of the war and hoping for better days among the ruins of the hamlet of La Roche.

They have in common their Parisian life in Montparnasse, their studies with the great masters of that time as well as the friendship of the Americans Jackson Pollock and Sam Francis, before becoming established artists themselves with some being part of a workshop created by Stanley William Hayter.

All were in search of new values and a new meaning in their lives, and the call of André Lhote renewed their enthusiasm. They do not hesitate to leave everything to go live in a small village in southern Ardèche.

When they arrive in Alba-la-Romaine they are seduced by the beauty of the landscapes. The wild cliffs, the limpid water of the Escoutay river, the wellaligned vines, the wind in the hills, the blazing sunsets, the starry nights and especially the “white light” that they found nowhere somewhere else and which suddenly reveals itself to them when they leave the mountains and arrive in the plain of Alba-la-Romaine.

They buy about thirty houses, and thanks to the impulse of a man keen on history, Mr. Delarbre, and the competent dynamism of the mayor, Mr. Rieu, the hamlet of La Roche finds a new life. The artists begin to reassemble the ruins, sometimes without roofs or windows, with half-collapsed walls, like real builders, wielding trowels and hammers before finding their brushes and chisels.

The inhabitants, seeing this “invasion” arriving who speak a dozen different languages, was quite taken aback. Then as time went on they got used to it while some rejoiced that these characters create a little animation in the village.

Their behaviour and their habits continued to arouse a sometimes ironic curiosity. Their artistic work especially. However, good neighbourly ties are created in the village. The inspiring landscapes, the simple and peaceful life of the peasants, in harmony with nature, contribute to exchanges and encounters. Artists also discovered the treasures that the earth has hidden

Village women become “adoptive mothers”. They take the place of artist mothers who devote themselves fully to their work.

Vernissage of an exhibition between 1950 and 1953 in Alba-la-Romaine. From left to right: Hope Manchester, Theodore Appleby, Stanley Hayter, Monique Calmettes, Elizabeth Guggenheim, Marita Van der Poest Clement, Alejandro ObregÓn and Kees Van Willigen

for centuries - the fossils of animals and plants and the vestiges of the GalloRoman and medieval times amazed them.

Their creativity was renewed, and they began a new life of intense work and shared joy, despite the harshness of the winters and the lack of comfort, without running water or electricity. Clothes were washed at a cold water tap in the street and the only bathroom in the village was available to women. They sleep in cots, sometimes with a solitary dog under the blanket to keep warm.

The mutual aid is great on the part of the inhabitants of the village. The mason

helps with the restoration of the ruins, a farmer, with his team of oxen, goes to look for wood on the Coiron plateau for the sculptures of one or the other, the postman sometimes sculpts with them, in return some help with agricultural work. Beautiful friendships are formed. They have a deep respect for each other. Village women become “adoptive mothers”. They take the place of artist mothers who devote themselves fully to their work. These generous women marked the memory of the children of that time who never forgot them.

The chatelaine, Alice Braun, former star dancer of the Paris Opera, thanks to her kindness and generosity is nicknamed

“Mammy d’Honneur”. A place of meetings and a place of celebrations, the castle is open to everyone, including cats and dogs wandering in the village.

The first exhibitions, from 1950 to 1952, took place at the public school at the same time as the votive festival, then the artists planned to find a permanent place to exhibit their works. It was at this time that Mr. Houdayer, who ran an architectural firm in Paris, with his wife, fitted out a permanent exhibition hall in a house they called “La Petite Chaumière” in reference to “La Grande Chaumière” in Montparnasse, drawing and painting academy that many artists have attended. La Petite

Chaumière becomes a place of very lively exchanges, with debates on art and literature sometimes giving rise to tumultuous disagreements. However, the artists evoke the great respect that there is between them. No one felt superior to others, no one allowed themselves the slightest disparaging criticism of the work of a colleague.

From 1955, some of these artists who arrived in 1949 settled in nearby villages or returned to their country of origin. Others remain in Alba and their children still live in their parents’ homes. For years, artists have succeeded each other in Alba-la-Romaine, which has become a real “City of the Arts”.

The exhibition of works by these artists is open every day between 10.30am and 1pm and 2pm to 6pm until the 2nd of July 2023 at the Château de Vogüé and is organised by the association Vivante Ardèche and the children and friends of Alba. The nearest airports are Lyon and Marseille from where you can drive or get a train. Don’t miss this part of previously undocumented art history!

chateau@chateaudevogue.net

www.chateaudevogue.net

When they arrive in Alba-la-Romaine, they are seduced by the beauty of the landscapes… and especially the “white light” that they found nowhere somewhere else.

Ted Appleby, oil on canvas

Helen Philips, bronze sculpture

Hope Manchester, oil on canvas

Kees Van Willingen, oil on canvas

Elisabeth Guggenheim, lithograph

Patricia Sanderson, oil on canvas

CHRISTINE XUEREB SEIDU

From Restitution BENINESE ART to Revelation

Benin has had a long history of art making, although the guilds of bronze casters and ivory carvers were formed to facilitate the making of art for royalty, for the king who was the head of the kingdom.

When we see that within the past thirty years Benin emerged as one of the most productive artistic sites across west Africa, it comes as no surprise. We have been seeing quite a few Beninese artists like Meschac Gaba, Georges Adéagbo, Leonce Raphael Agbodjelou, Romuald Hazoumè and Dominique Zinkpè exhibiting in the international scene.

Dominique Kouas, Calixte Dakpogan and Cyprien Tokoudagba started engaging with the contemporary art scene whilst still holding on to tradition, but they paved the way for other artists who broke away from convention. Between 8 November 2012 to 13 January 2013, two contemporary art biennials centred on the exact same theme, took place simultaneously in Benin, gaining further attention to the country’s art scene.

Vodunaut, 2021, by Emo de Medeiros. Photo by Nolwennlaureg, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Ishola Akpo with his Agbara Women photographs. Photo by Adoscam, CC BY SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Recently, between 18 January and 15 May 2023, we saw a contemporary show of Beninese art hosted by the National Foundation of Museums (FNM) at the Mohamed VI Museum in Rabat, Morocco. This came after the success of the original exhibition-event titled “Art of Benin of yesterday and today: from Restitution to Revelation” held at the Palais de la Marina in Cotonou, Benin which was rather a diptych exhibition presenting both classical and contemporary art. Twenty-six royal treasures returned by France after one hundred and thirty years were exhibited together with one hundred and six contemporary artworks by thirty-four Beninese artists. The exhibition in Morocco only featured the contemporary works which were presented in a diversity of forms, showing the vitality and intensity of the creativity of the visual arts scene in Benin.

In this exhibition, artists from different backgrounds express their vision of contemporary Benin and their desire to re-explore legacies making up their rich traditional past. Each of the artists exhibiting are seen to develop on the themes and materials used in making up the three chapters of the exhibition, which are Recurrence-Variations of the Sacred and Divine, Transition(s) and Transgression-Hybridization. The theme of Recurrence-Variations of the Sacred and Divine was touched upon by the artists Cyprien Tokoudagba, Yves Appolinaire Pede, Kiffouli Dossou, Ludovic Fadairo, Dominique Gnonnou Kouas, Euloge Ahanhanzo- Glele and Epaphras-Degnon Toihen. Dominique Zinkpe, Ishola Akpo, Moufouli Bello, Laeila Adjovi, Remy Samuz, Julien Sinzogan, Francois Aziangue, Youss Atacora, Edwige Aplogan, Eliane Aisso, Nathanael Vodouhe, Tchif and Thierry Oussou had their work focusing on

Transition (s). The last batch of artists worked on the theme ‘Transgression Hybridation’ and these artists included Georges Adeagbo, Senami Donoumassou, Sebastian Boko, Gerard Quenum, Dimitri Fagbohoun, Emo de Medeiros, Romuald Hazoume, King Houndekpinkou, Meschac Gaba, Ponce Zannou,Louis Oke Agbo, Eric Mededa, Nobel Koty and Charly D’Almeida.

With African nations increasingly represented and the Venice Biennale,

CHRISTINE XUEREB SEIDU founded Christine X Art Gallery in 2004 after a university degree in Art History and Anthropology. She has returned to Malta after a year in Ghana where she explored African art and culture.

it is of no surprise that the Republic of Benin is the latest country to announce its debut participation in the upcoming 60th Venice Biennale, taking place from the 20th of April to the 24th of November 2024. It will be curated by the founder of the Lagos-based nonprofit African Artists’ Foundation, Azu Nwagbogu and assisted by Yassine Lassissi, artistic director of Lagos’s La Galerie Nationale du Bénin, and architect Franck Houndégla. Although the project to be presented at Benin’s

pavilion is still unknown, we know that Nwagbogu’s belief on restitution and repatriation is well aligned with the agenda of the Benin government which resulted in the return of the twenty-six artefacts looted by France one hundred and thirty years ago. We eagerly look forward to this.

Souvenir Palace, 2010, by Meschac Gaba. Photo by Julian Stallabrass from London, UK, via Wikimedia Commons

EXHIBITIONS

A selection of art events from around the world

25.03.23

Until 13 August 2023

AFTER IMPRESSIONISM: INVENTING MODERN ART

The exhibition organised in the National Gallery focussus on the work of Paul Cezanne, Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin, and examines their influence on the next generation of European painters. It showcases more than one hundred paintings and statues that were made between 1880 and 1914.

The National Gallery, London, United Kingdom

Bathers (Les Grandes Baigneuses), Paul Cézanne, c1894 – 1905 / National Gallery

31.03.23

Until 16 July 2023

05.23-10.23

05.04.23

Until 28 August 2023

BASQUIAT X WARHOL. PAINTING 4 HANDS

Two of the most influential artists of the 20th century, Andy Warhol and JeanMichael Basquiat, were also close friends. During 1984 and 1985, they worked on a series of 160 paintings together. This year, the biggest-ever exhibition dedicated to that partnership will be displayed at Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris.

Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris, France

Jean-Michel Basquiat, Andy Warhol, 6.99, 1985 Acrylic and oilstick on canvas, 297 x 410 cm

15.09.23

Until 7 January 2024

MICHELANGELO AND THE CONSEQUENCES

Albertina in Vienna is home to a valuable collection of rare Michelangelo’s drawings. Because of their frugality, they put them on display very rarely. However, they will make a centrepiece of one of the best exhibitions in European museums in 2023. Next to them, the museum will display drawings of some famous artists from the 16th and 17th centuries, like Raphael, Rubens or Dürer. So, visitors will have an excellent opportunity to explore Michelangelo’s influence on those artists.

Albertina, Vienna, Austria

HUGO VAN DER

GOES: BETWEEN PAIN AND BLISS

Hugo van der Goes was one of the most important Flemish masters from the second half of the 15th century. Later on, he became an archetype of a troubled artist. Twelve out of fourteen of his artworks will be displayed at this Berlin exhibition. So, it’s an excellent opportunity to delve deeper into the work of this fascinating painter.

Gemaldegalerie, Berlin, Germany

Copyright: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie, Dietmar Gunne

20.04.23

Until 3 September 2023

HILMA AF KLINT & PIET MONDRIAN

Tate Modern Museum in London is putting Hilma af Klint and Piet Mondrian in dialogue. Both artists were pioneers of abstract art and influenced generations of painters after them. The exhibition is quite extensive, with more than 250 artworks on display.

Tate Modern, London, United Kingdom

Left: Hilma af Klint The Ten Largest, Group IV No.2, Childhood 1907 Hilma af Klint Foundation

Right: Piet Mondrian Composition with Red, Black, Yellow, Blue and Gray 1921 Kunstmuseum Den Haag

23.09.23

Until 10 December 2023

MARINA ABRAMOVIC

One of the top art events in 2023 will be the Marina Abramovic retrospective. She has been the leading conceptual and performance artist active for more than forty years. For this exhibition, Abramovic is going to prepare some new work. However, many of her older performances will also be restaged by the younger artists.

Royal Academy, London, United Kingdom

Image:

Nicola Erni Collection. Photo: © Reto Pedrini Photography © The Estate of Jean-Michel Basquiat. Licensed by Artestar, New-York. © The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. / Licensed by ADAGP, Paris 2023

Marina AbramoviC, Four Crosses: The Good (positive), 2019. Corian, aluminum, iron, oak with LED panels, 550 x 357 x 29 cm. Courtesy of the Marina Abramovic Archives. © Marina Abramovic

Michelangelo Buonarroti: Male Nude from Behind (Study for the “Battle of Cascina”), c.1504, Black chalk, heightened with white. © Albertina Museum, Vienna

Spotlight / Events / Malta

May - October 2023

EXHIBITIONS

Curated events in Malta

02.05.23

Until 22 May 2023

FRANCESCO ZAHRA

Francesco Zahra died 250 years ago in August 1773. He made a significant mark in the Maltese Baroque art scene and is considered to be one of the foremost artists of the 18th century. He grew up and was artistically mentored in the maritime town of Senglea and practised as an up-and-coming artist until his marriage in 1743 when he moved to Valletta and prospered considerably as an established and sought-after artist. His oeuvre is mainly religious painting, but portraiture was another area that he delved into and even excelled in. Although Zahra died in Valletta, this commemorative exhibition takes his work to his place of birth where he grew up and developed his artistic skills.

Organized by MUZA at the Oratory of the Holy Crucifix in Senglea, it is the first of a series whereby MUZA’s outreach efforts will come to fruition through the temporary loan of works from the National Art Collection to a locality that bears some form of relevance to a commemorative event or a special theme or an artist that is represented in the said collection.

MUZA - Museum of Fine Arts, Auberge D’Italie, Merchants St, Valletta Monday to Sunday 10am to 6pm www.muza.mt

19.05.23

Until 25 June 2023

JOSEPH CHETCUTI

05.23-10.23

Four years on from his death, sculptor and bronze foundry artist Joseph Chetcuti is finally receiving the attention he deserves in a retrospective entitled ‘The Sculptor and the Bronze-smith’, held in the MUZA Camerone. Awarded a scholarship to study sculpture and design at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence, Chetcuti went on to model and cast several important commissions, including the 2012 bronze statue of Grandmaster Jean de Valette in Valletta. However, outside of his collaborative efforts and his role as a teacher at the School of Art, his aesthetic or idiom is little known. As much of a debut as it is a retrospective, the exhibition showcases several of Chetcuti’s original plaster casts, sketches and preparatory works, bronze pieces, bozzetti, and maquettes of public works.

MUZA - Museum of Fine Arts, Auberge D’Italie, Merchants St, Valletta

Monday to Sunday 10am to 6pm www.muza.mt

12.05.23

Until 29 May 2023

VIA: THE WAY OF THE STREETS

VIA: The way through which one passes. The pictures presented in this exhibition with works by Jacob Sammut document the human element in the streets, describing life to date. It stands not only to teach people today what our lives are like but also to stand as a tool to educate those who get to see the photos in the years to come. The small selection of images used in this first edition of ‘VIA’ has been chosen from a vast archive of work that I started working on in 2014. The photographs are to be treated as documents to be preserved and archived for future generations to see. They were shot using 35mm or 120 medium-format, black and white film, which were then developed and hand-printed on fibre-based paper in the darkroom

Christine X Curated, Tigne street c/w Hughes Hallet Street, Sliema

Monday to Saturday 10am - 1pm & 4-7pm except Fridays from 2pm www.christinexcurated.com

08.06.23

Until 28 June 2023

IL-HABBA TAL-GHAJN –EXHIBITION BY ALEX DALLI

Il-Habba Tal-Ghajn, a solo exhibition by Alex Dalli, brings together a body of work which spans a 30-year career in the arts. The exhibition traces Dalli’s painterly journey from the figurative into the abstract. Dalli is widely recognised to be one of Malta’s leading modern artists. His sensitivity to colour, surface and form drove him to develop the minimal style that he is now known for and his art is rooted in a spiritual belief which he expresses and explores through simple forms and pared down compositions, looking for different, less encumbered, ways of seeing. Il-Habba Tal-Ghajn is curated by Gabriel Zammit.

Malta Society of Arts, Palazzo de La Salle, 219 Republic Street, Valletta Mondays to Fridays: 9am to 7pm, Saturdays: 9am to 1pm, Sundays & Public Holidays: Closed www.artsmalta.org/events

Alex Dalli, Siggu (2022) oil and acrylic on board. Photo by Lisa Attard

02.GABRIEL BUTTIGIEG ON LITTLE HANS’ FEAR OF HORSES (AND MAX GRAF), 2023 Willow charcoal, white emulsion, acrylic paint and satin varnish on raw linen 120 x 130cm stretched €1,990 info@christinexart.com 03. CO-MA STUDY003, 2023 Charcoal on marble 50 x 50cm €1,000 info@lilyagiusgallery.com 04. PATRICIA O’BRIEN TWIST OF FATE, 2022 Mixed medium on canvas 100 x 100cm €1,300 info@christinexart.com

01. ELISA VON BROCKDORFF LOBSTERS Limited edition print, signed 60 x 90cm, unframed €500 info@lilyagiusgallery.com

05. ALEXANDRA AQUILINA STRAWBERRY WIGGLE 2 colour screen print, No. 5 of 10 editions, signed 22 x 22cm €100 info@lilyagiusgallery.com 06. MARIO ABELA EARTH JUICE, 2022 Oil on canvas 100 x 80cm €1,900 info@christinexart.com

07. JAMES MICALLEF GRIMAUD STATE OF LIMBO Fabriano printmaking rag 310gr, no. 9 of 10 editions, signed 60 x 40cm unframed €200 info@lilyagiusgallery.com 08. JULIEN VINET ANCIENT OLIVE Ink on paper monoprint 60 x 80cm, unframed €1,000 info@lilyagiusgallery.com 09. STEPHANIE GALEA LEANING IN COLOUR Acrylic paint on silver gelatin handprints on RC photographic paper, shot with Pentax 67 medium format camera 72 x 62cm, framed €800 info@lilyagiusgallery.com

No.23 Artpaper / 038