Maltese artist/educator/curator Raphael Vella will speak about some of his projects in Malta and elsewhere: from his own creative practice, shown locally and in many international contexts to larger projects he initiated in recent years: the Valletta International Visual Arts (VIVA) festival, the Curatorial School in Valletta and Divergent Thinkers, a project for emerging artists. Mr. Vella, who was recently selected to co-curate the Malta Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2017, will give some insight into the creation of an art pavilion at this world famous event.
The island of Malta presents a small postcolonial and relatively peripheral scenario within the European Union that has historically been crisscrossed by various exchanges of ideas related to the arts, language, architecture and traditions. Modern art developed relatively slowly in the 1950s while the contemporary art scene picked up during the 1990s.
The program will also offer the opportunity to view a stellar example of contemporary Maltese art, No Place Like Home, an exhibition of Mr. Vella's work on display at the EU Delegation premises.
This program is in conjunction with the Embassy of Malta.