“Isn’t life under the sun just a dream’, asks German video and photography artist Tobias Zielony in an exhibition currently being held at Blitz in Valletta.
The show is the culmination of a year-long project, and as with other exhibitions at the gallery in St Lucy Street, Valletta, it is very timely, both politically and socially.
Life under the sun typically refers to an inescapable reality, “the product of often unfulfilled dreams”, says curator Sara Dolfi Agostini.
“In Malta, a year-around tourist destination where visitors seek solace and evasion, the title also hints at complex stories and relationships that lie behind the veil of architecture, local marketing and economic convenience,” she says.
The exhibition is a complete survey of the artist’s practice as it includes some of his major works since 2010, alongside a new commission realised in Malta.
One can, for example, admire Le Vele di Scampia (2009), Mr Zielony’s groundbreaking project, for which he spent several months working in a low-cost, semi-abandoned district in the outskirts of Naples, which has come to epitomise violence, drugs and organised crime, as exposed in Roberto Saviano’s book Gomorrah (2006).
For the first time, Mr Zielony explanded a photographic work into moving images, not simply relying on normal footage but on the syncopathed rhythm of 7,000 shots sequenced in a mute stop-motion animation.
Ricky and Tiziana (2019) from the artist’s new series shot in Malta. Below: The Citizen (2015)The exhibition is a complete survey of the artist’s practice
In Manitoba (2009-2011), he presents a juxtaposition of portraits, landscapes and museum shots to reveal the intricate world of competitive realities the citizens in this Canadian city face.
For his Malta works, Mr Zielony focused on horizons, notably the ones “that connect past and future”, as captured in the expression of a teenager or in the relentless movement of ships in and out of Valletta.
The portrait work features a group of teenagers – party-goers and breakdancers – the artist met during two distinct trips to Malta in 2019.
“Today, as people are constantly taking photographs, they have unquestionably become more comfortable in front of the camera. However, the subjects of these photographs show an introverted approach when compared to the duckfaces and plastic poses of the cloned Instagram humanity,” Ms Dolfi Agostini says.
“They are not impersonating any canon; rather, they are interacting with Zielony, caught somewhere between moments of staging and spontaneity. The proximity to the camera is like a live negotiation yet, finally, they all gaze into the distance, as if their eyes were turning inwards, projecting themselves into the future while looking for answers.”
The Citizen (2015)
A photo from the Manitoba series (2011)
Hurds Bank%2C 2019
A still from Hansha (2019)
Kalandia Kustom Kar Kommandos (Dream Lover)%2C 2014
On the other hand, Hurds Bank (2019), is a slow, hypnotic film projection of ship watching between Valletta’s Grand Harbour and Hurds Bank, a shallow stretch of sea just outside Malta’s territorial waters and a major offshore anchoring area on the route between Europe and North Africa. The images are accompanied by a voice-over which recounts a distillation of first-hand news and personal explorations of Malta and its surrounding sea.
“As the narrator toggles between media news of alleged corruption surrounding the killing of Daphne Caruana Galizia and existential questions embedding a wistful lyricism into hard facts, the darkness swallows everything except the distant quivering lights of the ships,” Ms Dolfi Agostini notes.
Mr Zielony was awarded several international residencies, such as the International Studio and Curatorial Programme New York, USA (2006), DAAD Los Angeles, USA (2006), Karl-Ströher-Preis, Germany (2011), Künstlerstipendium Goethe Institut Ramallah, Palestina (2013), Tokyo Wonder Site Residency, Japan (2017), Goethe-Institut Villa Kamogawa Residency, Japan (2018).
In 2015, he was invited by renowned art curator Florian Ebner to represent Germany at the Venice Biennale, and some of his work is currently on view at the Fotomuseum Winterthur, Switzerland.
Isn’t Life Under the Sun Just a Dream is open at Blitz, 62, St Lucy Street, Valletta, until February 29. It is open between Tuesdays and Fridays from 2.30 to 6.30pm and on Saturdays between 10am and 1pm. It is closed on Sundays, Mondays and public holidays. The exhibition is supported by the German Embassy.