Willie Apap – Colour and Light is touted by many local art aficionados as the exhibition of the year on the Maltese cultural calendar. Times of Malta discusses the exhibition with its curator Maria Cassar.

ToM:  It’s been announced as the largest-ever Willie Apap exhibition. What is the claim for this?

MC: There are 70 works on exhibit, 50 oils (on canvas or board) and 20 inks on paper, including several sketches. It is by far the largest retrospective exhibition since Apap’s untimely death in 1970. And at least going by my research, I never came across anything as close at any of his Italian exhibitions.

ToM: But he also exhibited in other countries …?

MC: Yes, for example the United Kingdom, Sweden, Switzerland … and maybe others which he visited to paint, like Spain, Brazil, but I have no evidence of that. Most exhibitions outside Italy were collective ones, not solos and he exhibited twice in London with his brother Vincent.

ToM: And what about Malta?

MC: Apap last exhibited in Malta as a teenager in 1937, before leaving to study at the Regia Accademia in Rome. He never held another personal exhibition in his native land and when his works would occasionally appear in a collective exhibition locally, it was probably Vincent making sure that his younger brother does not get forgotten.

ToM: Tell us something about Apap’s artistic journey.

MC: It can be best split into phases. First came the formative years, his attendance at the Malta Government School of Art and the youthful drive to escape insularity (1930-1937). Then came his study years in Rome, with the evolving art currents already immersed in a Futurism and Novecento movement coloured by an emerging Fascist idiom, followed by the war years and the transition to the post-war period (1938-1950).

ToM: Was that the period interrupted by his imprisonment and trial by jury in Malta?

MC: Indeed, it was. When war broke out, Apap, unlike his student friends Victor Diacono, Emvin Cremona, Esprit Barthet and Anton Inglott, who returned home, decided to stay in Rome. Fired by high artistic ideals, he graduated from the Accademia in 1942 and launched his career by opening up a studio in Via Margutta and embarking on first exhibitions.

But there was a price to pay: as the war ended he was rounded up with other Maltese in Rome considered irredentesti, jailed at Regina Coeli, tried before a Maltese court in 1947 and subsequently acquitted. “When all I wanted was to be a painter”, he used to say.

ToM: So how did all this mark his career?

MC: One can say that all this gave Apap more determination about where he wanted to go with his artistic journey. In fact, the next phase can be described as his early maturity, as he emerged from the influences of his previous masters and rose to prominence as a portrait painter (1950-1960). These were the years of important portrait commissions in Italy, Malta and the UK, of more exhibitions in Rome and the clear stylistic influences being absorbed from important Italian contemporaries.

ToM: And would you say that this was Apap at his best?

MC: I call the next (and final) phase, 1960-1970 – his late maturity – as his best. It saw Apap further consolidate his style, evolving his striping technique which he was to apply to his various genres of art. From the human figure to landscapes, from dancers to still-lifes, his travels across Italy or as far as South America and Scandinavia, they were sustaining his maturing artistic profile.

ToM: Willie Apap – Colour and Light: what’s in the name?

MC: Most of the works on exhibit are from the 1960s, the period when Apap’s art rose to new heights. His palette had transformed to a cooler one, complemented with the stripes which seemed to illuminate his subjects. I especially like how one art commentator had described Apap, watching him at work: “Light and colour seem to enter the artist’s eyes, mix with his soul and then flow out again to suit the purpose of the composition.”

He prefers to strip the body of its material appearance

ToM: How did you choose the specific works for the Ħaġar exhibition?

MC: Fortunately, my academic studies, travels and research brought me in contact with the span of Apap’s oeuvre probably like no one ever before. So, I knew what was available in collections and wanted the exhibition to offer a panorama of his versatility: portraits, landscapes and still-lifes, the human figure, dancers, sacred art and the Brazil period.

ToM: In fact his nudes and dancers are quite prominent in the works on display…

MC: The human figure is a dominant theme in Apap’s art and, as the works exhibited demonstrate, he is not interested in capturing the carnal look of the female figure. He prefers to strip the body of its material appearance, inviting the viewer to gaze not into the face but into the soul.

ToM: It’s also been said that some works have never been displayed before or were recently discovered. Can you mention a few?

MC: Noteworthy is The Incarnation (1966), previously known only from photographs taken in a Milan gallery; now it can be admired as one of Apap’s masterpieces. Columns of light fall on the Virgin and the Child with a double-entendre around the Son of God who is shown in the womb of his Mother while also incarnate.

But there are others, like Two Female Figures Undressing, Seated Female looking at Window, Brazilian Women, Bicycle and an Open Door, Towels on the Balcony, Female Figure with Flowers, Ballerinas, and others. All these are from the 1960s, the artist at his peak.

ToM: Those are oils … what about the inks?

MC: There are some interesting discoveries in that section too, like Girl in Contemplation, Acrobat and Circus Horse and Reclining Female Nude reading Paper. But there are also drawings which, in a scholarly way, can be categorised as sketches and primi pensieri. They are mainly composed in pen and often accompanied by charcoal strokes, hatching and other effects, such as gauze dipped in ink or wash.

ToM: You gave a lot of importance to the drawings.

MC: Already as a boy, Apap was known to draw and sketch feverishly, perfecting hundreds of drawings in a short space of time. The items exhibited, some of which literally belonged to sketchbooks or else drawn on whatever the artist would lay his hands on, are of particular importance as they are a transposition of the artist’s thoughts on paper. We also made sure to display the drawings in glass cabinets for the best possible viewing experience.

ToM: Any works on exhibit that you consider as ‘favourite’?

MC: You’re like asking a mother to name a child she prefers! This is a feast of works and each one of them is unique and special. They all bring out the bravura of the artist in their own way.

Whether the striking oils depicting portraits, figures or dancers enchanted by the mastery of his strisce, or the inks on paper strapped out from sketchbooks but which bring to life his fastidious attention to technique – it is a remarkable collection of exhibits.

ToM: Your final thoughts about the exhibition.

MC: I praise the management of Il-Ħaġar Museum for the vision and courage to put up such an ambitious project. Many of us travel to visit art galleries and museums in different parts of the world but here is one exhibition that compares with the best. It is a reminder of Willie Apap’s belonging to an international milieu that had long outgrown his native land, earning himself a place as one of Malta’s leading exponents of 20th-century art.

The exhibition Willie Apap – Colour and Light is running at Il-Ħaġar - Heart of Gozo Museum, Victoria Gozo until October 10. The museum is open Monday to Sunday from 9am to 5pm, with late evening openings separately announced on social media. Admission is free. An outstanding, full-colour 100-page exhibition publication (Il-Ħaġar Gems Series No. 20) produced by Midsea Books is available against a donation of €15, by e-mailing info@heartofgozo.org.mt.