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Malta: Rising Goddess

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Book Launch: Josef Kalleya & Dante: A Child's Tormented Soul in Paradise (Volume 2 & 3)

 

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Fertility as Spirituality in Modern Art: Mediterranean Mythology and Beyond

 

On the 28th of November the Changing Gear conference addressed the notion of the  Mediterranean as a fertile site for the formation and evolution of artistic concepts manifested as a plethora of forms, especially as mythological, religious, and spiritual deities.

Furthermore, this conference sought to reframe the art history of various cultural zones across the Mediterranean basin by inviting speakers to engage with different methodological approaches or with modes of analyses which debate the Eurocentric perspective. 


Convenor:
Prof. Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci

Speakers:
Prof. Paul Sant Cassia - University of Malta
Prof. Rosanna Ruscio - Accademia di Brera, Milan
Dr Barbara Vujanović - Ivan Meštrović Museums – Meštrović Atelier, Zagreb
Dr Frederika Tevebring - King's College London
Prof. Theopisti Stylianou-Lambert - Cyprus University of Technology
Dr Antigone Heraclidou - CYENS Centre of Excellence, Cyprus
Prof. Giorgos Papantoniou - Trinity College Dublin
Prof. Christine E. Morris - Trinity College Dublin
Matthew Robert Shirfield 

 

 

 

'Fertility as Spirituality in Modern Art: Mediterranean Mythology and Beyond' - International Conference

 

Please click here for more information. 

 

 

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The APS Mdina Cathedral Contemporary Art Biennale 2023 launch

 

 

 

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Mdina Cathedral Contemporary Art Biennale now open

Please click here for the article

 

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Fourth APS Mdina Cathedral Biennale currently under way

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APS Mdina Cathedral Contemporary Art Biennale

Please click here for the article

 

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Josef Kalleya & Dante: A Child's Tormented Soul in Paradise (Volume 2 & 3)

The Book Launch is free and open to the public. 

 

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Cristóbal Gabarrón participa en la Bienal de Arte Contemporáneo de Mdina 2023

Please click here for the full article. 

 

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El artista muleño Cristóbal Gabarrón plasma la identidad mediterránea en la Bienal de Arte de Mdina en Malta

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El arte de Gabarrón brilla en la Bienal de Malta

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Gabarrón participa en la Bienal de Mdina de Malta

Please click here for the full article. 

 

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Mediterranean Institute Seminar: Mediterranean and Modernist Multiplicity in Art

Guest Speaker: Professor Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci, University of Malta

Venue: Mediterranean Institute, Tal-Ħursun Farmhouse, University of Malta (Msida Campus)

Date: Tuesday 21st November 2023 at 18:30

The Mediterranean Institute is delighted to be hosting the inaugural Mediterranean Institute Seminar for this academic year with a talk by Professor Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci, who will be discussing Mediterranean and Modernist Multiplicity in Art. The Seminar will take place on Tuesday, 21st of November at 18:30 at the Ħursun Farmhouse, the Institute’s historic premises at the University of Malta Msida Campus.

The colonial global expansion of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries roped in a corresponding aesthetic language - a language not only reflecting but also enhancing and defending the very same interests of economic and industrial hegemony. This power relationship created a vertical-linear methodological approach in art historical studies. Artistic movements and developments were, and still are, studied within these parameters, and, more specifically, solely in relation to cosmopolitan centres. Verticality has long been sustained as an approach to studying international artistic relationships. The paradox is that postcolonial and other related studies have appropriated that very same colonial language and replaced it with a neo-articulation, one which nevertheless addresses the same content the same hegemonic interests. This talk will attempt to provide a different approach to the study of Mediterranean Modern art, namely a horizontal-diagonal perspective. Aside from delving into this methodological approach, the talk will frame the Mediterranean basin as a region in its own right. This introductory talk tackles the suppression of collective consciousness, engendering thus the fragmentation of Mediterranean interconnectedness, an interconnection that was displaced by the verticality of the ‘master-slave’ dichotomy. The artistic Europeanisation of North African cultures and their de-Ottomanisation, together with the Greek upheavals and the effect these seismic events had on the development of Modern art will here be placed under artistic scrutiny. The Malta-Mediterranean connection will play a central role in the debate.

Prof. Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci studied Philosophy, Law and the Arts. He graduated from the University of Malta, from the State University of Kiev, and from the State University of Moscow, and undertook postgraduate research studies at the State University of Milan. He has authored several books on Modern and Contemporary Art, Philosophy of Art, and Maltese twentieth-century art. 

Schembri Bonaci is the founder of the Fine Arts Programme and of the Modern & Contemporary programme within the Department of Art and Art History, Artistic Director of the APS Mdina Cathedral Contemporary Art Biennale, and was Artistic Director of the Strada Stretta Concept, a cultural programme under the auspices of the Valletta Cultural Agency, until 2022. His recent publications include  a philosophical-methodological treatise on the works of Frank Portelli and Antoine Camilleri. He has just concluded his series of publications on the Maltese artist Josef Kalleya’s visual dialogue with Dante’s Divina Commedia and a novel history of Mediterranean Modern Art. His 'Metal and Silence' work formed part of the Venice Biennale 2022 Malta Pavilion.

The Mediterranean Institute Seminar is free and open to the public. Students are particularly encouraged to attend. A Q&A session will follow on from the Seminar. Attendees are cordially invited for refreshments after the event. For more information on the Mediterranean Institute Seminar, kindly get in touch with the MI Administrator, Ms Isabelle Abela at isabelle.abela@um.edu.mt 

Please click here for further details on the event. 

 

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Mediterranean and Modernist Multiplicity in Art

The Mediterranean Institute Seminar is free and open to the public. Please click here for further details on the event. 

 

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Diana and Actaeon: the cynegetic nature of art

Please click here for the article

 

two months to go until the opening of the APS Mdina Biennale 2023

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Exploring ‘Mediterranean Goddesses’: an interview on the upcoming edition of the Mdina Biennale

To access the interview published in the Sunday Independent please click here

 

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meeting with Norwegian artist Marianne Heske

Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci and Nikki Petroni met with Norwegian artist Marianne Heske and her assistant Hedvig Skjoerten to discuss Marianne's project for the 2023 edition of the APS Mdina Biennale. For more information on Marianne's work, visit her websitehttps://www.marianneheske.no/

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From left to right:  Marianne Heske, Hedvig Skjoerten, Nikki Petroni and Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci.

first team meeting for 2023

The first team meeting of 2023 at the University of Malta Valletta campus. Exciting new plans for the year ahead!

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Professor Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci, Dr Nikki Petroni and the 2023 Mdina Biennale team. 

From left to right: Michaele Zammit (design and av assistant), Kylie Aquilina (assistant website manager), Brooke Vella (communications assistant) and Francesco Bellia (blog manager).

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From left to right: Kylie Aquilina (assistant website manager), Miguel Ellul (project assistant), Professor Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci (artistic director) and Justin Fenech (project assistant). 

APS Mdina Biennale in the December 2022 issue of Artpaper

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open call for artists

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participation in the Day of the Mediterranean - 28th November 2022

 

A series of lectures were organised to commemorate the Day of the Mediterranean in collaboration with the Union for the Mediterranean. These lectures, delivered by Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci, addressed various socio-political aspects related to the evolution of twentieth-century Mediterranean art. 

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Professor Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci delivering a Mediterranean Modern art lecture to UM students

public lecture with Cristóbal Gabarrón

 

Contemporary Spanish artist Cristóbal Gabarrón has been invited by the Modern and Contemporary Art section of the Department of Art and Art History, University of Malta, to give a public lecture on his relationship with Mediterranean identity and how this has been explored in his work.

The lecture will be held on Friday 9th December at 16.15 at Gateway Hall C, University of Malta Msida Campus.

Gabarrón is a participating artist in the 2023 APS Mdina Biennale.

 

Click here for more information on the public lecture.

For more information on Gabarrón's current exhibition in Malta, please visit the Spazju Kreattiv website.

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Cristóbal Gabarrón with Dr Nikki Petroni, curator Rupert Cefai, and UM students

Cristóbal Gabarrón and his artistic exploration of the Mediterranean 

Cristóbal Gabarrón was invited by Changing Gear and the Modern and Contemporary Art unit of the Department of Art and Art History, University of Malta, to give a talk of the way that the Mediterranean has influenced his artistic development. The talk was held at the University of Malta on the 9th of December, 2022.

Gabarrón is a participating artist in the APS Mdina Biennale 2023.

For more information on the artist, please visit his official website: https://gabarron.org/

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Cristóbal Gabarrón with Mdina Biennale artistic director, Professor Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci, Dr Nikki Petroni, Rupert Cefai, UM students and guests 

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