A centenarian by the name of Tessie Scerri is the main protagonist of a new photobook and an exhibition now open at the National Archives, in Rabat.

Accompanied by many relatives, the 102-year-old attended the launch last week and was inevitably the centre of attraction.

“Always looking prim and proper, Tessie loved the attention she received. She also loved the book and was amused to see herself in it,” Angela ‘Giola’ Cassar, one of her great-grandnieces and the brains behind the project, said.

Ms Cassar, a photographer, started documenting Auntie Tessie, as she is affectionately known by all her family, in summer 2018.

“Within our family, she is an institution. An unmarried former teacher and still bursting with joie de vivre, she giggles with glee at every little story she tells. Her voice doesn’t fail her, her memory does,” she said.

She was especially intrigued by the fact that, after experiencing both world wars and having suffered many losses and endured hard times, Tessie was still optimistic about life.

“In many ways, she’s the typical centenarian with a tank full of positivity,” she noted.

She added that the woman was neither particularly frail, nor wrinkly, nor terribly senile, bitter or quiet. “Quite the opposite. She’ll only fall silent when she wants to avoid a sensitive subject,” she remarked.

The centenarian signing copies of her book, simply titled Tessie, at its launch last week.

A biographical collage

Ms Cassar refused to exploit these stereotypes and chose to focus on some of Tessie’s prized possessions: her jewellery. In fact, the narrative unfolds from close-ups of beautiful and ornamental objects that have been passed down within the family.

The book unfolds from close-ups of Tessie’s jewellery. Photo: Giola Cassar

“Throughout the book, page by page, portrait by portrait, one is drawn into a biographical collage spanning over a century and beyond into a fabricated narrative. Tessie is here both the storyteller and the embodiment of all the places, objects and people she tells about,” Ms Cassar said.

A bilingual text runs parallel to the visuals in the photobook, which was funded by Arts Council Malta and through a successful crowdfunding campaign on the platform zaar.com.mt.

Narrating Tessie’s story was not shorn of challenges, according to author and bookbinder Glen Calleja.

“She is not just a person with a long past and portraying her as such would have been banal and untruthful,” he said. “She is a living woman and her tense is the present tense, not the past. Tessie is, therefore, more than just a 100-year-old jukebox of adventures and stories.”

The 150-page book, designed by  Adrian Gauci, also presents a fictionalised narrative of whom Tessie longed to be. This starts off with her finding a number of letters that might or might not have been addressed to her.

“Ms Calleja’s text presents scenarios where all the what-ifs of a hundred plus years meet,” Ms Cassar remarked.

The brains behind the project, Giola Cassar, at the launch of the photobook and exhibition.

If writing about Tessie was notsuch a straightforward task, photographing her turned out to be an easier feat.

“She relished the attention and the opportunity to clown a bit for the lens. She posed uninhibitedly and was very accommodating,” Ms Cassar said. “This came as a very welcome surprise to me and I’d like to think that it has helped me understand her and her life a little better.”

The exhibition will be running at the National Archives of Malta (Rabat) until November 7. Opening hours: Monday to Saturday from 8am to 2pm and on Sunday from 10am to 1pm. On Thursday and Friday, one can also visit the exhibition between 4 and 7.30pm. To order the photobook, write to mail@giolacassar.com.