[WATCH] Jason Micallef promises 'biggest feast ever' for V18 opening

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Valletta 2018 will be launched on January 20 next year, Jason Micallef, V18 chairman said, but just before that, there will be a ‘spectacular’ New Year’s celebration in St George’s square which will serve as a teaser of what is to come later that month.

Micallef was replying to questions, by Saviour Balzan on Xtra on TVM last night, regarding the stage which developments had arrived at, now that Valletta’s year as European Capital of Culture is just around the corner.

“I think the people have appreciated the activities held in Valletta in the last four weeks. This is a different Christmas for the Maltese, as our capital has taken on a special, baroque-influenced look for the celebrations.

Micallef said that, despite having other obligations, namely leading a political TV channel, he was still able to manage his everyday duties and his V18 chairmanship concurrently, due to the experience he ha, and the time management skills he gained throughout the year.

Challenged on whether he agreed that the public perception was that the Labour Party had taken historically not had a positive approach towards culture, Micallef said that he didn’t think this was so, maintaining that Labour had promoted local and international culture throughout the past decades.

“When in government in the 1970s, the Labour Party had representatives in its cabinet which represented the cultural sector, and when in opposition is historically always had within it people of culture who worked for Malta’s cultural heritage.”

“Towards the end of the 1970s and the beginning of the 1980s, Labour was also involved in Maltese song festivals, and theatrical performances, such as Gensna,” he said.

Micallef said that his being a political appointment proved challenging when it came to working with the artistic and other persons involved in V18, however his deep belief in the project and his dedicated way leading it quickly worked to overcome any initial criticism.

“We want to put the message across that culture is accessible to everyone - it is a celebration of different peoples united by one thing - celebration and enjoyment,” he said, “And what we want for V18 is having culture which all can take part in, within the framework of a ‘festa’. This is the basis of our programme.”

The recent architectural developments in the area around City Gate where very important within the V18 context, Micallef said, in reply to a question by Balzan about how V18 fitted in with the changes Valletta had seen in the last few years.

“We want V18 to leave a legacy which will created a ‘brand’ Valletta,” he said, “The road to this started under the Gonzi administration, with the restoration, partly through EU funds, of the city’s fortifications.”

“The Renzo Piano project, which was highly criticised in the past, is now being appreciated more, because it is now leading to the giving back of the area around Valletta’s entrance. The restoration of the Triton Fountain has created a beautiful open area, which is a continuation of the Piano project.”

Micallef said that he personally believed that Valletta would be even more beautiful without cars in it, controversial as this may sound.

“Valletta is the only capital city which has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since the early 1980s. It was not built for cars, which is why we have given back to the public certain spaces, such as the Castille area and parts of Archbishop Street. It is people who make Valletta a capital,” he said.

Joanne Attard Mallia, V18 Programme Coordination, explained in a video message how work was currently being done to implement the 2018 programme, which was designed over the last few years.

“There are a substantial number of projects which are now in the product phase, both projects specific to V18, as well as others which we are cooperating on with other organisations,” Attard Mallia explained.

Micallef said that it was not an easy task to communicate to those involved in the project, which involves some 400 programme, 140 of which are on a large scale, that the celebrations where not about Valletta being Malta’s capital, but about it being a European capital.

“The programme had to thus have a strong European and international dimension, and had to include within it a lot of different cultures from around Europe and the world

The question, he said, was how to bring together Valletta’s and Malta’s culture, with the wider cultural dimension. To do this, they strived to engage foreign actors within the cultural scene, with those operating within Malta’s scene, in order to create a marriage of sorts between local and foreign culture.

“We have created a strong balance between Maltese culture, and culture in wider international sphere.”

“We cannot forget that it is both Valletta and Leeuwarden, in the Netherlands, which will both be European Capital of Culture for the whole of next year,” Micallef continued, “We are collaborating extensively with artists in that city, including working together on a theatrical opera, to be staged in both cities”.

One of the major events in the programme will be the launching of the programme, which Micallef described as ‘the biggest feast Malta has ever seen in terms of a the opening of cultural programme’, and which will involve four piazzas - Piazza Kastilja, Piazza Tritoni, Piazza San Gorg and Piazza San Gwann.

Another ‘massive’ programme will be ‘Valletta Pageant of the Seas, a carnival at sea, taking place on June 7, which will see the Grand Harbour closed purposefully for the five hour show.

“The idea is to see the Grand Harbour as a large stage on the sea. It will involve carnival floats, large yachts brought from abroad, acrobatics, dancing - a massive spectacle, all on the water.”

He confirmed that there would be international famous names associated with theatrical, musical and dance performances who will be involved in the programme, which will be announced in due time.

Regarding film director and V18 artistic director Mario Philip Azzopardi’s role in the programme, Micallef said Azzopardi had been leading the team responsible for five flagship events, namely the opening and closing programmes, an opera called “We Are Refugees”, the sea carnival, and another event planned for October.

“All these required five years to plan, and where logistical nightmares,” he explained, “The various cultural programmes will involve around 1,000 performers, 300 or so of which are international names.”

When asked how much the government’s expenditure on the project was, Micallef emphasised that he considered to be an investment, rather than government spending.

“Various restoration and regeneration works took place as part of the project, and this is all an investment in our capital, which also created new jobs in the cultural sector and the creative economy, which now employ more people than the construction sector,” he said, adding that this also had a positive impact on hotels, shops and restaurants in the city.

Micallef admitted that Valletta had not yet reached its goals when it came to keeping the city clean, as he remarked that the fines introduced this week for Valletta residents who breach new littering rules were part of the government’s efforts to address the issue.

He said that the Valletta local council cooperated closely with us in the drawing up and implementation of the V18 programme, and they would also need to work together to create a cleaner capital city.

“The influx of people into Valletta is always increasing, according to research by the National Statistics Office, and this is mostly due to the impact of the Valletta 2018 Foundation’s work,” Micallef maintained.

The foundation would not come to an end after 2018, he said, but it would continue by way of the creation of the first cultural agency for Valletta, Micallef said in his closing comments.