Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1024340
| SUNDAY • 9 SEPTEMBER 2018 maltatoday 11 CULTURE ENVIRONMENT CULTURE ENVIRONMENT MALETH / Haven / Port - Het- erotopias of Evocation is the title of the curatorial project selected by Arts Council Malta to repre- sent Malta at the next Biennale di Venezia in 2019. Setting Malta, Maleth, at the centre of its theme, the project focuses on the role of the island as cultural centre of the Mediter- ranean Sea, both in history and in current times. The project seeks to present an exhibit which invites the audience to reflect on their own lifetime journey of self- discovery, their own search for a personal Haven/Port. Drawing on the tri-fold of his- tory/archaeology, myth/tradi- tion and vision/expectation, the exhibit aims to create within the space of the Malta National Pavilion a topos/locus of artistic conversation for the whole of the Mediterranean Sea. Absolutely entuned with this year's theme of the Venice Art Biennale as described by its ar- tistic director, the project 'will aim to welcome its public to an expansive experience of the deep involvement… engaging visitors in a series of encounters...', lead- ing to self- discovery. Creating a space within a space, Evoking Heterotopias invites the audience to participate in an intuitive dialogue with the artworks which are organically placed within the built shell of the Venetian Arsenale. As ves- sels/islands within a sea, art- works come together to create a unique experience for the visi- tor, who is asked to traverse the exhibition space in a voyage of self-discovery that takes place in a suggestive fictitious space of controlled light and sound. The winning team is composed of Hesperia Iliadou Suppiej (lead curator), Vince Briffa (artist), Klitsa Antoniou (artist), Trevor Borg (artist) and Matthew Jo- seph Casha (architect/designer). The production management team is composed of Stephen Ciantar and George Lazoglou. The aim of the Malta Pavilion is to offer a platform through which Maltese contemporary artistic practices understood within the broadest sense of the term, can be exposed, contextu- alised and presented to an inter- national audience. The 58th International Art Exhibition will be titled May You Live in Interesting Times, a phrase of English invention that has long been mistakenly cited as an ancient Chinese curse that invokes periods of uncertainty, crisis and turmoil. La Biennale di Venezia 2019 artistic director Ralph Rugoff ex- plained his choice for the theme: 'an exhibition should open people's eyes to previously un- considered ways of being in the world and thus change their view of that world...' where 'the meaning of artworks is not em- bedded principally in objects but in conversations - first be- tween artist and artwork, and then between artwork and au- dience...' Malta returned to La Bien- nale di Venezia in 2017 after a 17-year absence. Prior to that, it had participated with a special exhibition of Maltese Artists in 1958 and a National Pavilion in 1999. Everybody can recognise a gull (or seagull, as many refer to them): big, white, noisy coastal birds. But there's a similar group, closely related to gulls but much less familiar, and these are the terns. Terns too are relatively large, white, coastal birds but they have a slimmer, more elegant build. Their flight too is lighter and more buoyant and their tail is always forked to some degree. Nine tern species occur on migration in Malta, none of them common. One of these is the black tern (M. ċirlewwa sewda), so called be- cause in summer much of its body turns black or dark grey. It is a scarce species here but birdwatchers spot some virtually every year – a nice bunch of black terns have in fact been gracing our southern bays for the past days. All terns live around water, but while most are seafarers, diving expertly after small fish, some prefer the tamer environs of lakes and marshes. The black tern is generally the marshy kind but on migration any water with fish in it is fair hunting grounds! 625. BLACK TERN Visit Friends of the Earth's website for more information about our work, as well as for information about how to join us. You can also support us by sending us a donation - www.foemalta.org/donate GREEN IDEA OF THE WEEK 528: Find out more and register at www.foemalta.org/nature Text Victor Falzon Photo Aron Tanti Winning project for Malta Pavilion at 2019 Biennale di Venezia ŻFINMALTA National Dance Company is back from Germany where its presentation at the big- gest dance platform in Europe struck a chord and promises to open up new international op- portunities and propel it for- ward. The young dance company, led by artistic director Paolo Mangiola, represented Malta at Tanzmesse 2018 in Dusseldorf where 1,900 professionals from more than 50 countries were in- vited to present their works. "This experience surpassed all our expectations. Despite being a young company, we managed to generate interest through the dance language we use — this was considered to be fresh and novel," Mangiola said. This repertory company of 10 dancers is embarking on a regenerative journey and trans- forming itself into a Euro-Med- iterranean hub, focused on fur- ther developing contemporary dance within the region. "This has been a very exciting experience and it puts ŻfinMalta on the map of the international dance scene, helping us to estab- lish important contacts," Man- giola added. Riding on this enthusiasm, the dance company has, on its return, immediately immersed itself in this week's premiere of playwright Francis Ebejer's Boulevard, a co-production with Teatru Malta and the Manoel Theatre. Then in the first week of No- vember, ŻfinMalta will be pre- senting its own production, Voyager, a joint collaboration between Mangiola and Maltese- born visual artist Austin Camill- eri. The production, a taster of which was presented at Tan- zmesse, is inspired by NASA's mission 41 years ago, when it sent a present into outer space to give intelligent life a snapshot of Earth's diversity, sounds, feel- ings and thoughts through 116 images encoded in analog form. This Golden Record, a 12-inch gold-plated time capsule launched on the Voyager Space- craft in 1977, was intended to communicate the story of hu- mans to extraterrestrials. The sounds from earth got Mangiola pondering on what sounds and historical images we would send to outer space if a second Voyager mission was to be launched in the near future. Voyager was such a hit at Tan- zmesse, that in November in- ternational dance curators will be flying to Malta to watch the premiere. "We're looking forward to sharing these experiences with our audiences and sparking a deeper connection with dance on the island," Mangiola said. ZfinMalta strikes a chord at international dance platform