Writing on Heritage
Fishing Nets
Fishing nets introduce this new body of work exploring themes of tradition, craft and migration. Maltese traditional fishing boats called Luzzu date back to ancient Phoenicians in 700 BC. They had eyes painted on the bow, said to protect the fishermen at sea. I metaphorically cast the net to capture and reinterpret my cultural heritage through a contemporary lens. It comments on the Maltese fishing industry which has been a constant source of income for the local people for many centuries. It also references the current situation of migrants seeking refuge by dangerously crossing seas in fishing boats, clinging on to fishing nets when their boats deflate, and they end up in Malta.
Making the net involves a repetitive and methodical process of unravelling, looping, tying and knotting. It imitates an athletic performance, using the whole of my body to stretch, pull, throw and tie the very long strips of fabric. Care is taken to ensure the diagonal patterns are equally spaced out. These negative spaces are filled with irony; while a net is made to catch and trap, it still allows its prey to breathe.
The net is made from repurposed fabric. A conscious decision was made, not to use nylon twine so as not to engage in the conversation of pollution, ghost nets and plastic waste. The act of knotting also extends to the cultural tradition of Maltese bobbin lacemaking, bizzilla. While generations of Maltese fishermen knot and repair their nets, narrating stories and singing folk songs, similarly, their wives, mothers and daughters would gather to make lace, threading narratives, songs and prayers into their work.
A large-scale interactive installation of ropes and banisters represent the linen threads and bobbins respectively. The only instruction given is to weave their way through it. They harmoniously fall into a rhythm, collaboratively, carefully and instinctively negotiating their way around each other. Bending, reaching, ducking and twisting, they avoid tension, forming new interesting shapes. The participants decide when they have finished their part of the performance and slowly, individually put down their banister and walk away silently. What is left of the final woven rope is very sculptural and suggestive of a boat’s tangled ropes on the mast, it seems to be poised ready to take a bow.
Eyes
This collection is a personal investigative attempt to experiment with elements borrowed from religion, oral history and myth. The symbol of the Eye appears in many different cultures, but all carry the same reference to warding off evil and ensuring protection. Quite similarly, in the religious context, the ‘all-seeing’ eye represents divine watchfulness. In my work, the eyes also refer to the multiple identities of previous generations which we embody in our present form. We are made up of many different nationalities because of human migration. We are therefore all participants of our shared inherited identity. I celebrate this through the Malterna collection.
The Malterna Collection
Malterna (anagram of maternal and plays on the word Malta).
Malterna contemporises the goddess of fertility, which is an iconic figure on the island and dates back to 3500 BC. She is brought into the 21st century and has embodied her predecessors’ identity. Her silhouette is adapted to meet current trends and she is covered in a skin of eyes. In Malterna Venus, she is painted on a polycarbonate sheet which allows light to shine through and cast her colourful shadow on the layer beneath which holds the islands of Malta and Gozo. More eyes approach the islands which reflect multiple gazes bearing witness to the changes Malta is currently undergoing. Malterna Mater is the predecessor to the Trinity Collection. Here we see the first example of the three generations at different stages of their life, who are content in each other’s presence, accept their differences and importantly, are located on the shore, emphasising the historical location where arrivals of new identities took (and still) place.
Trinity Triptych
Trinity Triptych reveals deliberate repetitions of the number three. In a religious context the Holy Trinity is formed of the Holy Spirit, The Father and The Son. Here it is contemporised and, some may argue, controversially gender reversed. This raises the question of why generations do not deconstruct what they inherit. They often accept it and without a mere challenge. The Holy Spirit is in fact feminine, in the Old Testament. We see three female figures in three different stages of their life, representing generations, the cycle of life, more repetition. This collection was exhibited in London and the underlying concept referenced Hildegard von Bingen who applied her own portrayal of the Holy Trinity, which encouraged me to do the same.
