Vincenzo Bonello rarely binned a letter, a postcard, a telegram, a visiting card, a receipt, an invitation. Over a long life (1891-1969), father hoarded them all, amassing disorderly piles, on shelves, in drawers, on tabletops, an irritant to mother’s innate neatness and her devotion to propriety. The tall heaps of paper more often than not ended as clustered towers of Pisa, but lacked the bizarre stability of the original. He stacked then in no particular order, not by sender, or by date, or by subject. Looking for something after years must have been his nightmare. This obviously gave him comfort, if only by knowing the paper must be there, somewhere.

Portrait of Vincenzo Bonello by Giorgio Preca. Courtesy of Heritage Malta

When, just at the beginning of World War II, my father was arrested and detained for his anti-colonialist beliefs, the security police confiscated all his correspondence, in the hope of nailing him to evidence of sedition. I pity the poor plodders, totally unfascinated by art and history, having to sift through innumerable letters still in their original envelopes, and only finding testimony of father’s unrepentant fondness for the higher energies of culture. Most of the archive was returned to him on his homecoming from central African concentration camps, five malaria-bountiful years later.

Among these early letters, I found a few from the painter Giorgio Preca which throw some light on an obscure segment of the artist’s student life in Rome, on the art milieu that surrounded him there, on his struggles and his achievements. They confirm Bonello as the benefactor of young Maltese talent, always eager to spot and promote promising youngsters. Father had cultivated every available contact in Malta and Italy, and these connections he exploited to help anyone who he believed deserved that assistance.

Early self-portrait by Giorgio Preca.

Preca was born in 1909; he had already reached his formative 20s when he started corresponding with father. The letters I retrieved span four years, 1933-36, when his studies in Rome were leaving an indelible imprint on his future world view. They contain some ‘physical’ information too: when in Malta, he gave his address as 164, Strada Santa Lucia, Valletta; in Rome, at first he lived at 16, Via del Leoncino, a few minutes’ walk from Via del Corso and the Spanish Steps, today the seat of the Fondazione Carla Fendi and the Associazione Nazionale Club della Libertà. By April 1936, he had moved to 7, Via Margutta, the preferred haunt of artists and art students. Sadly, the photos the sender enclosed with the letters were no longer in the envelopes. He wrote in perfect, idiomatic Italian. Some of the letters are in reply to others father had addressed to Preca, but the Bonello side of the correspondence is lost.

Preca’s contacts in Rome include fellow Maltese students, art teachers, and occasionally, the higher powermongers. He mentions, not too appreciatively, Guido Calì Corleo, Carmelo Robinich and Carmelo Galea. Preca’s antagonism to Calì Corleo may be quite understandable: in the 1933 competition for a scholarship in painting and modelling, in which he took part with Antonio Inglott and others, Preca had placed second after Calì Corleo.

His fellow artist Toussaint Busuttil, whose portrait he painted, on the other hand, does not come in for criticism. Toussaint’s portrait by Preca is still with the Busuttil family. The highly-talented sculptors Antonio Sciortino and George Borg, among his teachers, he respected – with Borg, my father’s cousin, he had actually struck a lasting friendship. Commendatore Alberto Hamilton Stilon, very active in promoting Maltese art students in Rome, features regularly, as does Cipriano Efisio Oppo, who besides being a deservedly renowned painter, had the added kudos of being an ardent Fascist and secretary general of the powerful national Fascist corporation of artists – a not-unprofitable acquaintance in Mussolini’s Rome.

Painting by Cipriano Oppo, Preca’s teacher at the Rome Accademia.

When the School of Art was set up in 1925, to ensure an independent selection of its proposed teachers, father had invited foreign examiners to sit on the selection board. These included Cipriano Oppo, who came to Malta that year. Three years later, Oppo donated a print by Carlo Carrà to the national collection. The Malta museum also has since 1928 a powerful painting by Antonio Barrera, Il grano d’Oltremare; first exhibited in the Turin Quadriennale of 1923. It is fair to speculate Bonello acquired it on the advice of Oppo.

In Rome, Preca also came in contact with Valerio Mariani, the art historian who published the very first modern study on Mattia Preti and who formed part of the chain of Italian intellectuals in love with anything Maltese. Preca also had an entrée with Umberto Biscottini, the kindly and occasionally ruthless Machiavellian academic who manoeuvred all the official and unofficial contacts between Italian culture and the Maltese who resisted colonialism. Biscottini became the point of reference between the two. These letters reveal that Biscottini, as factotum of the Regia Deputazione per la Storia di Malta, had placed a visionary trust in the young Preca and had commissioned from him a ‘historical’ painting of St Paul leaving Malta. The story of this atypical religious painting is known; not so its present whereabouts. The artist informs Bonello that he intended to submit his self-portrait to the Venice Biennale.

1932 drawing by Giorgio Preca from the School of Art. This artwork forms part of the Malta School of Art collection within the Malta National Collection, courtesy of Heritage Malta – MUŻA, the National Community Art Museum – Mikiel Anton Vassalli College.

These letters also reveal the student’s aesthetic preferences in his formative years: He singled out by name who of the current Italian painters and sculptors had impressed him most in the Quadriennale of 1935. All of them outstanding modernists, still hugging the figurative, but already stretching their sensibilities and distancing themselves. He admired Giacomo Balla, who was to make an international, and lasting, reputation among the Futurists. There are echoes of Balla in some of Preca’s intermediate work. Preca’s revolutionary journey had begun.

Though, I believe, it may have started even earlier, in 1932. The Istituto Italiano di Cultura had brought over to Malta three young and promising Italian painters. These had remained some time on the island and produced many works in the modern idiom. Each of the three, Donato Frisia, Raffaele de Grada and Enrico Paulucci, exhibited 20 of their Malta paintings at the premises of the Istituto. Their unorthodox works created an uncomfortable stir among the locals – it was the first time, after epochs of remasticated baroque and sugared romantic ottocento, that a Maltese public found itself exposed to the less aggressive forms of modernism – with major perplexity, if not shocked rejection. But Paulucci must have left a lasting impression on Preca – I detect marked echoes of his style in the earlier Preca production.

In one of his letters, Preca congratulates Bonello on his election to the select Academy of St Luke in Rome. This historical and prestigious academy, founded in 1577 and today housed in Palazzo Carpegna in Piazza dell’ Accademia di San Luca, brought together the genuinely leading artists and art historians. Membership in this highly exclusive community was, in Italy, deemed to be the Nobel Prize in art. As far as I know, Bonello became, in 1935, the second Maltese academician ever to be elected over the centuries, after Melchiorre Cafà.

Portrait by Preca painted when still a student. This artwork forms part of the Malta School of Art collection within the Malta National Collection, courtesy of Heritage Malta – MUŻA, the National Community Art Museum – Mikiel Anton Vassalli College

By the time the art student settled in Rome, he had set about enriching his art-history depository, becoming an avid frequenter of museums and exhibitions. He mentions his rapt visits to the Galleria Doria-Pamphilj, the Galleria Mussolini, today renamed Galleria Comunale d’Arte Moderna, just opened in 1931, and to the second Quadriennale of 1935, held at Villa Carpegna, willed and organised by Cipriano Oppo, who Preca eventually met. There he fell in love with the works of three contemporary sculptors, “a certain Messina”, Arturo Martini and Ermenegildo Luppi. All three later achieved international renown. The painters who impressed Preca at the Quadriennale also constituted the Olympus of modernist Italian creativity in the 1930s. Preca assumed that Bonello would have been familiar with their works already. He also visited the massive Mostra della Rivoluzione Fascista, another Oppo brainchild. Two of his 1933-4 envelopes have their postage stamps cancelled by the Mostra Rivoluzione Fascista Roma handstamp.

It must have been around this time that Preca painted the large portrait of his mentor Vincenzo Bonello, seated, now at the MUZA. It is a forceful image, austere, unflattering and insightful.

The six letters found so far

I knew there must have been some early Preca letters in those piles of paper left by father. I managed to fish out the following six. There may be more, perhaps many more.

Letter No 1, dated August 7, 1933, from Malta to Rome (two pages).

GP thanks VB for confirming that he had obtained a 3,000 Lire scholarship for the artist.

The Italian consul had not yet contacted him, nor had he been informed whether the recommendation of the School of Art to the Maltese government had been accepted. In fact, he had learnt from a private source that the government had rejected the proposal. He would inform VB the moment he got an official answer. He urged VB to do everything possible to obtain an improvement on the Italian scholarship he had been promised “as only this way would I be saved”.

Letter No 2, dated December 13, 1933, from Rome to Malta (two pages).

GP informs VB about his enthusiasm for Rome. He had visited the Campidoglio, the Galleria Mussolini, the Galleria Doria (Pamphilj) and the exhibition of the Fascist Revolution, where he admired so many marvellous works.

He was frequenting the “classe del nudo” at the English Academy, where Prof. (Antonio) Sciortino was kind enough to allow him to start work on the very first day. In (George) Borg, he had found a true friend.

He went twice to Hotel Continental to seek Dr (Alberto Hamilton) Stilon, but he had not yet arrived and they had no idea when he would. He was unsure what to do next, as Stilon’s presence would be very precious. He asked VB to guide him in case Stilon delayed, so as not to waste time.

GP could not present himself for the Regia Accademia exams, as he had not yet received his luggage, which he had already forwarded before his departure. It contained all his colours and brushes. He hoped they arrived soon as otherwise he had to wait for the Christmas holidays to pass. He had already visited the secretariat of the academy, and they informed him he could turn up any day, but before his luggage arrived, he could do nothing. He sent his, and Borg’s, best regards.

Letter No 3, dated December 28, 1933, from Rome to Malta (two pages).

GP had met with Dr Stilon who had been very kind to him. He had shown him photos of some of his works, which Stilon had really liked. Stilon kept the photos to show to Prof. (Umberto) Biscottini, who he had to meet that same day and with whom he fixed an appointment for GP on the following day. When he met Biscottini, the latter congratulated him on his works, and was very kind. Among other things, Biscottini promised to help the artist to set up a personal exhibition at the Circolo Nazionale di Roma. As for the scholarship, he said GP would be getting 2,000 Lire. GP did not tell him that they had promised VB 3,000 Lire.

GP then informed VB that he had been admitted to the Regia Accademia di Belle Arti, third year in the painting course. His exam consisted in painting a female nude in oils in only five days, while the others had almost one month to do it. Had he opted for the fourth year, it would have been equally easy for him to get in. Professors (Umberto) Coromaldi and Pippo Rizzo appeared very happy with his work. The other students thought he was entering the work for the fourth year, and remained gaping he had finished his nude in just five days.

(Guido) Calì (Corleo) had sat for his exam for the second year, but they put him in the first year. (Carmelo) Galea and (Carmelo) Robinich were not accepted for the regular course, but had been left in the Scuola libera del nudo in the same academy, as the commission had found them deficient. It was rumoured they would be allowed in the regular course after the festivities.

Letter No 4, dated July 6, 1934, from Rome to Malta (one page).

GP tells VB he had just received the result of his exams and that he had obtained the maximum score, coming first in the exam from the third to the fourth year “to my very great satisfaction”. He thanked VB for all he had done for him. On Tuesday, he would be back in Malta. He enclosed a photo of one of his works in the exam.

Letter No. 5, dated February 23, 1935, from Rome to Malta (one page).

GP congratulates VB on his election to the Accademia di San Luca, an honour which he deserved.

GP had visited the Quadriennale and had remained “enthusiastic”. There was so much to see and to learn from. Among the painters, he singled out (Felice) Carena, (Giacomo) Balla, (Leonardo) Bazzaro, Giacomo Grosso, (Giuseppe) Graziosi, (Carlo) Romagnoli, (Antonio) Barrera “and many other who you surely know”. Of the sculptors, he liked particularly “a certain Messina” (Francesco). (Arturo) Martini, and (Ermenegildo) Luppi also has some fine works.

With the letter, GP enclosed some (photos of) studies, among others, of a portrait of (Toussaint) Busuttil, who VB knew, made in two sessions, and of the painting commissioned by the Regia Deputazione per la Storia di Malta which he had now completed and would soon be handed over. The work showed the departure of St Paul from Malta. GP thanked VB for his unending trust in him and passed over greetings from Commendatore Stilon.

Letter No. 6, dated April 2, 1936, from Rome to Malta (three pages).

GP was replying to VB regarding exhibiting his (self-) portrait in the Biennale. He had already undertaken the formalities to send the painting to the exhibition. He had the honour of visiting the secretary to the Biennale, the Hon. (Valerio) Mariani, who shared his hope his painting would be accepted. “I know that it is not easy, but I want to try. Courage and forward!” He had to deliver it by April 21.

As a present, GP gave the painting of M (Enrico Mizzi? Arturo Mercieca? Contessina Moroni? Or Mussolini?) which was received with great satisfaction, and would be published. He asked VB to keep this secret from everyone, especially from (Edward Caruana?) Dingli, including the painting for the Biennale, as he did not want to “fare una brutta figura” (should it be rejected?).

GP had been given an appointment with (Cipriano Efisio) Oppo, but had not met him yet as he was outside Rome. On his return, he would surely meet him. In his studies, besides the nude, he had been practising composition, making drawings and bozzetti. Should anything interesting result, he would turn it into a painting.

Rome, for GP, was the city that never damped his enthusiasm for art, visiting museums and exhibitions. He accepted with great pleasure VB’s encouragement.

This period of Preca’s formative years is excellently covered in Dennis Vella’s 1999 master’s thesis Maltese Artists in Rome, 1930-1940, (Vol. 1, pp. 173-186, unpublished). These letters fill in some gaps in that narrative.

Acknowledgements

Edward de Gaetano for providing the images of Giorgio Preca’s residences in Rome during his studies, and Alexander Debono for several enlightening suggestions.