MUSIC

Piano recital by Rachel Gauci

Rachel Gauci, a recent graduate of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in Glasgow, is presenting a solo piano recital featuring major works by Brahms, Liszt and Janáček at the Malta Society of Arts in Valletta, today at 8pm.

For more information, visit https://artsmalta.org/ and for tickets, click here.

FILM

Irish Film Days: Dating Amber

Spazju Kreattiv is screening the 2020 Irish comedy drama Dating Amber as part of the Irish Film Days cycle of films.

Set in Ireland during the mid-1990s, the film follows 17-year-olds Eddie and Amber who decide to stage a relationship in order to stop everyone speculating about their sexuality.

Eddie is keen to follow his father into the military, while Amber dreams of moving to the liberal hub of London. However, their ‘ideal’ arrangement begins to fall apart, forcing Eddie deeper into denial as Amber realises that a perilous future awaits her best friend unless she intervenes.

Directed by David Freyne, Dating Amber is certified 15. It is being shown today at 7.30pm. For tickets, click here.

Moonage Daydream

KRS Releasing has released a 2022 documentary on the English singer-songwriter and actor David Bowie.

Moonage Daydream, by visionary film-maker Brett Morgen and sanctioned by the Bowie estate, explores the artist's creative and musical journey and features previously unreleased footage from his personal archives, including live concert footage.

The documentary, certified 12, is being shown at the Embassy Cinemas in Valletta until tomorrow, September 29 and at the Eden Cinemas in St Julian's until October 4. It will also be showing at Spazju Kreattiv in Valletta on October 1, 2 and 9.

THEATRE

Shakespeare Intensive

The Manoel Theatre is hosting Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) actress and practitioner Lizzie Hopley for five days of workshops being held until Friday, September 30.

All levels of experience and ability are welcome. The workshops will serve as an introduction to Shakespeare or as a way to deepen and challenge one’s performance skills. 

Each workshop is offering acting, verse-speaking and movement techniques from the RSC rehearsal room and beyond, equipping one to develop one’s own speech or short scene for a shared performance at the end of the week. 

For more information, e-mail education@teatrumanoel.mt.

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PHOTOGRAPHY

Wiki Loves Monuments 2022

Malta is once again taking part in Wiki Loves Monuments, the Guinness World Record holder for the largest photography competition, which has reached its seventh edition.

The competition brings together photographers from around the world to take stunning pictures of Malta’s cultural heritage, which are to be shared on Wikipedia. Participation is free and open to all. The deadline for all submissions is Friday, September 30.

A jury composed of experts within the fields of cultural heritage, photography and Wikipedia will be selecting the winning entries and 10 submissions will be nominated for the international Wiki Loves Monuments contest, with the opportunity to win further prizes.

For details, visit www.wikimalta.org and the Wikimedia Community Malta Facebook page.

150 / Richard Ellis

The Richard Ellis Archive, consisting of 39,000+ glass negatives documenting the period in Malta and Gozo between 1861 and 1938, has been digitised in archival-grade quality for the first time in its history. 

The British-Maltese photographer (January 1842-December 1924) was one of the pioneers of photography in Malta during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Thirty large prints taken from his archive are currently on display at Spazju Kreattiv, Valletta, until October 23.

The exhibition is curated by Charles Paul Azzopardi and Ian Ellis. For more information, click here.

One may also read the Times of Malta interview with the collection's owner.

VISUAL ARTS

Exhibition by art group Brushes

The eighth exhibition of artistic group Brushes is closing today. 

Works by artists Fabiola Agius Anastasi, Adrian Camilleri, John Caruana and Madeleine Vella Satariano are on display at Palazzo Ferreria, 310, Republic Street, Valletta, from 9am to 6pm. They include aquarelles and acrylics and feature varied themes.

Paradoxes

Artist, muralist, designer and poet Damian Ebejer, son of playwright and novelist Francis Ebejer, is presenting an ‘autobiography’ of his art and life at the Wignacourt Museum, Rabat, until tomorrow, September 29.

The retrospective solo exhibition features mixed media artworks and is multi-themed.

Consult the museum’s Facebook page for opening hours.

Learn more about the artist from this Times of Malta interview.

The Cappuccino Brigade

The ninth solo exhibition of Debbie Caruana Dingli is on display at the Palm Court Lounge of The Phoenicia, in Floriana.

Curated by Charlene Vella, the collection of watercolour works is based on the artist’s observations of the native Maltese population and is named after one of the paintings on display whose heroine is a bossy woman, often pictured in the artist's colourful works.

The exhibition is open until Friday, September 30.

Read an article by the curator here.

An Ode in Stone

Artist Joe Xuereb is presenting an exhibition of limestone sculptures at The Phoenicia's Deep Nature Spa.

His rounded figures and forms represent universal shortcomings among humans such as greed, solitude and the entrapments of love. 

An Ode in Stone, curated by Louis Laganà, runs until Friday, September 30.

Read the Times of Malta interview with the artist.

Amelia Saint George works at The Phoenicia

Artist Amelia Saint George is exhibiting a number of her sculptures at The Phoenicia, Floriana.

The sculptures are in clay, bronze and mixed media, and portray animals, which Saint George is particularly well-known for, as well as some humorous sculptures that are more closely associated with her portrait sculptures.

Saint George, who has made Valletta her home, is an established, award-winning contemporary sculptor who has exhibited locally and internationally. She is also the author of several books on diverse subjects and holds sculpting lessons in her Valletta studio.

One may view her works at The Phoenicia’s reception area until Friday, September 30.

Time, Space …. and Palmyra

Artists Henry Alamango and Galina Troizky are presenting a joint exhibition at the Malta Society of Arts at Palazzo de La Salle, in Valletta.

The duo infuse two themes: the social implications resulting from the functional transformation of rural and urban space over time, and a crie de coeur reflecting a deep concern for an environment and populated space in progressive decline.

The exhibition also recalls how the ‘civilised’ world recoiled in horror in 2015 at the deliberate physical and cultural destruction wrought by IS in the ancient city of Palmyra, Syria, of Unesco World Heritage fame. Ironically, flashbacks of Palmyra continue to manifest themselves in Malta's spatial and cultural development, contributing also to solitary and anonymous lifestyles, loss of community, loneliness and pollution.

The artists ask whether we are also the perpetrators – or at least the acquiescent accomplices – to an ongoing ‘Palmyra’?

The exhibition runs until Saturday, October 1. It is open today and tomorrow from 8am to noon and 4 to 7pm andon Friday from 8am to 7pm. On Saturday, it will be open from 8am to 1pm, and during Notte Bianca, from 7 to 11pm. Entrance is free. For more information, click here.

Read the exhibition's review by the Times of Malta art critic here.

Dying Planet

Illustrator, designer and visual London-based artist ‘iella’ (Daniela Attard) is presenting a body of illustration work and paintings focusing on climate anxiety and existential dread at Spazju Kreattiv in Valletta.

The artworks on display focus on the global impact of climate change with some reference to local issues and include strange figurative work and characters which serve as modern allegories.

The exhibition runs until October 9. For more information, visit www.kreattivita.org. 

More insight into the exhibition is available here.

Willie Apap – Colour and Light 

A retrospective exhibition of works by Willie Apap (1918-1970), considered one of Malta’s leading exponents of 20th-century art, is currently on at Il-Ħaġar – Heart of Gozo Museum in Victoria.

The 70 works on display feature portraits, landscapes and still-lifes, dancers, human figures, sacred and ethnic works in oils and inks, and are accompanied by a lavish 100-page GEMS # 20 catalogue.

The exhibition, curated by Maria Cassar, runs until October 10. Opening hours are from Monday to Sunday from 9am to 5pm. Entrance is free.

The exhibition is supported by the Malta Tourism Authority and the Gozo Ministry’s Cultural Directorate. For more information, visit the museum’s Facebook page.

Read the Times of Malta interview with the exhibition's curator Maria Cassar here.

Thread

A collective exhibition by Ebru Çinar, Stefan Spiteri and Bernice Vassallo has opened at Il-Kamra ta' Fuq in Mqabba.

The three artists experiment a lot in the use of thread in their oeuvre. Apart from this medium, they are also bound by the thematic of nature and organic forms which are almost always present in their works.

The exhibition runs until October 17. The gallery is open from Mondays to Saturdays from 6am to noon and on Sundays from 7am to noon. More evening hours are announced weekly on Il-Kamra ta' Fuq Facebook page.

The Architecture Student Expo 2022

Spazju Kreattiv is hosting the Architecture Student Expo, a celebration of everything the Faculty for the Built Environment does at the University of Malta. It is also an opportunity for the creativity of students and their ideas of future spaces and structures to be communicated to society through designs, sketches, digital graphics and architectural models.

The exhibition runs until October 30. For more information, visit the event’s Facebook page and kreattivita.org.

BioArt Alchemy: Works by Anna Dumitriu

Spazju Kreattiv in Valletta is hosting an exhibition by internationally renowned British bioartist Anna Dumitriu.

The artist uses bioart, sculpture, installation and digital media to explore a range of topics, from the origins of society to the sustainable production of biodegradable plastic, cutting-edge genetics and the possibility of bacterially-enhanced super-humans.

The project, a commission of Spazju Kreattiv, features a collaboration with artist Alex May. It is supported by Esplora Interactive Science Centre and Science in the City, Malta.

BioArt Alchemy runs until October 30. For more information, click here.

Also read the Times of Malta interview with the artist.

OTHER EXHIBITIONS

The Santa Marija Convoy and the George Cross – 80 Years On

A Heritage Malta exhibition paying tribute to the heroes who valiantly gave their lives in order to ensure the victory of World War II closes today.

Visitors at the National War Museum at Fort St Elmo, Valletta, can see artefacts and archival documents related to two of the most well-known episodes of the year 1942 – the award of the George Cross and Operation Pedestal.

Opening hours are from 9am to 4.30pm. For tickets, click here.

Mom, I Don't Want War!

The Embassy of the Republic of Poland in Valletta is holding an exhibition entitled Mom, I Don't Want War! as part of the Polish-Ukrainian project of the State Archives and Mom, I See War initiative.

The aim of the exhibition, which runs at the Lower Barrakka Gardens in Valletta until October 3, is to show the tragedy of war through the eyes of children, by comparing historical and contemporary drawings by the youngest who lived and grew up during the war.

The drawings by Polish children used for the exhibition were drawn after World War II and document their experiences during the war and the German occupation in 1939-1945. The drawings are preserved in the Central Archives of Modern Records (AAN) in Warsaw.

The drawings of Ukrainian children are contemporary works related to the current war in Ukraine and collected on the Mom, I See War portal. See more on https://momidontwantwar.eu/en/.

Meet the Phoenicians of Malta

A Phoenician stone sarcophagus excavated last year at Għajn Klieb, on the outskirts of Rabat, is one of the major attractions of an exhibition that has opened at the National Museum of Archaeology in Valletta.

The exhibition brings to light the results of months of painstaking studies by a multidisciplinary team researching the sarcophagus and two other tombs discovered in the area, as well as their contents. The three tombs, although inherently different, shed light on the burial rituals of the earliest Phoenicians on the island.

The exhibition is open until October 30. The museum in Republic Street, Valletta, is open from Monday to Sunday from 9am to 4.30pm. Entrance to the exhibition is free of charge.

Dumnikani fil-Palazz: Home & Temple

[attach id=1235090 size="medium" align="right" type="image"]An exhibit at the Dumnikani fil-Palazz: Home & Temple exhibition. Photo: DOI/Jason Borg[/attach]

An exhibition at the Inquisitor's Palace in Vittoriosa tells of the special relationship between the palace and the neighbouring Dominican Order, especially in the post-war years.

Enemy war bombing in 1941 had left the Dominican community without a convent and a church, and they found temporary refuge beyond Vittoriosa. But they were called back by the need to fulfil their spiritual and educational mission among their people.

Eighty years ago, in August 1942, the Dominicans asked for temporary shelter at the Inquisitor’s Palace and, for almost two decades, the palace became the community’s home and temple.

The exhibition runs until January 8. The Inquisitor's Palace is open from Tuesday to Sunday from 9am to 4.30pm. 

whatson@timesofmalta.com