In Maltese we have a saying “mix-xewk joħroġ il-ward” which means that roses are begotten by thorns and one can fundamentally say this about Wibke Seifert’s work which was born out of the coronavirus lockdowns when many of us were tearing our hair out for lack of activities day after day; that is unless like myself and many of us artists who became so absorbed in our work due to lack of distraction that it was like a rebirth.

In Wibke’s case it was a birth; a mature calling if you like. With a solo exhibition at Xara Palace under her belt in late 2021 and another which opened on Easter Sunday running through to the end of April, Wibke has been working intensely on her paintings and the most interesting aspect of both exhibitions is that you can follow and above all feel the intense experimentation that normally younger artists go through…

Water Lilly

I vaguely remember my salad days trying out pastels, oil and chalk, acrylic and oil and even clay attempting to find a medium I was comfortable with, and which helped me express what I wanted to more accurately. I settled on gouaches and pen and ink, and it took me a long time and several years and exhibitions later to switch to the endlessly fascinating world of watercolour and have been happily working and marvelling at the wonderful effects it has for several years now.

Wibke has the advantage of being far more mature than I was when dealing with the variations of genre; all fellow artists will recognise in her body of work the same emotions and agonies we went through and still do when confronted with a tabula rasa of any kind.

Comino

Many people ask me how long it takes me to complete a painting and this question always floored me till Nicholas de Piro told me to reply, ‘all my life!’ He’s perfectly right. Whatever one produces is the summation of one’s entire life experience from the time we smeared our nursery walls with crayon and defaced our more boring schoolbooks with doodles. It’s a continual journey.

When one takes to painting at a mature age and there are many examples of very successful artists who did so, the development may be more painful as one must perforce catch up and establish a recognisable style of one’s own. Wibke’s work is immensely diverse; from Monet-inspired water lilies in a pond to surreal nudes, and from the traditional luzzu to abstracts reminiscent of the German expressionists.

Hörnum

Runner

Confused

Wibke seems to have settled for oils but the way she uses them are very diverse from the monochromatic Runner to the colours of Hörnum… to reinterpretations of Munch’s Scream; a painting I always found disturbing but unforgettable and which inspired Bacon to produce equally stunning but preoccupying paintings.

Therefore, one can recognise a huge galaxy of inspirations that Wibke has drawn on and which she’s trying her hand at with varying success.

This exhibition is indeed a journey which has required great courage on Wibke’s part as she navigates through a plethora of styles for our delectation.

Wibke is kindly donating part of the proceeds of this exhibition to the ever-needy Id-Dar tal Providenza. A most worthy cause.

From Now On is showing at the Xara Palace, Mdina, and is on until April 27.