City Gate project - a historical perspective

In defence of the bold innovations in the City Gate project way back in the late 1980s, Renzo Piano's admirers constantly reminded us that every epoch should leave its architectural imprint. I fully subscribe to this argument and firmly believe that every period in history, even if it is a mere fragment in time, generates its peculiar architectural symbol which subsequently acquires a political or spiritual significance far beyond its mere utilitarian purpose.

The unique Neolithic Temples in our islands bear witness to this - The Age of the Temples; they came to us at different periods chronologically and left their mark attesting to our claim as possessing the oldest standing structures in the world. Then came the Age of the Pyramids symbolised by such edifices as the pyramids of Gisa in Egypt; the Classical Age with its elegant Parthenon in Athens followed by the Age of the Stadia symbolised by the Colosseum in Rome.

Much later at the dawn of the 18th century arrived the Age of the Cathedral and Malta is justly proud of its magnificent baroque churches, a style that lingered on even with the advent of neo-classicism. In many European countries the first half of the 20th century was dominated by a type of architecture that was quintessentially political - fascist art, an expression of a mystical belief in the power of "race, blood and soil" which in most cases helped give architecture a passionate religiosity and raw emotive force.

In my opinion the present City Gate is an expression of this ideology which dominated Maltese politics for almost half a century; its architectural motif is a reflection of the prevailing "fascist" culture that spawned it. By tragic accident or subtle design it was erected on our attainment of independence, a fitting monumental blunder compatible with the muddled thinking and the elusive groping in search of a national identity prevailing in those days.

Yes, the present City Gate is ugly, monstrous, hideous, feeble and mendacious, but it was the belated product of an important period in our chequered history, an anachronistic edifice of an Age, a "triumphal arch" reminiscent of Italian architecture in the 1930s. Consequently, it is an essential part of our political history, an ignoble national monument to frivolity and folly whose stark reality is a constant reminder to us all. It would be a greater monumental blunder to replace it.

If we leave our architecture and monuments to the scrutiny of the "revisionists" no one can tell how far and to what extent they will go. The baroque iconoclasts of the Nazarene epoch in the early British period is a case in point.

In Italy, many art historians believe that the monument to Vittorio Emmanuele II in the heart of Roman Rome sticks out like a sore thumb among the ancient splendour that was Rome; they also contend that the Vatican and the Bernini masterpiece would look more imposing, more magnificent without the Via della Riconciliazione... but so far as I am aware no attempt has ever been made to change these structures.

They are considered as an integral part of Italy's contemporary history. I believe that we are only justified in erecting a new City Gate if we decide to enter the Guinness Book of Records in order to proudly announce that we are the only country in the world that will have changed its city gate at least five times. But then people do so many foolish things to have their name inscribed in this book.