Celebrating heritage and connection across borders

What inspired you to explore the figures of Sheela Na-Gig and Sansuna in your latest exhibition?

The idea was the curator’s, AnneMarie Saliba. She wished to find a way of bridging the two countries, Malta and Ireland, and these two folkloric figures, with their deep roots in the two countries’ historic past. Both Sheela and Sansuna are connected to what makes us human—birth, life, joy, sex, sublimity, nostalgia, death and decay. They are perennial themes in my work so I was immediately attracted to interpreting the stories of these two figures. And strangely, the way AnneMarie explained her vision for this exhibition and her choice of Sheela and Sansuna echoed my own experiences of beginnings, endings and metamorphoses in recent months.

How does your new expressionistic style differ from your previous works, and what prompted this evolution?

The seed of this exhibition was sown one moment last autumn at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool. One painting in particular stopped me in my tracks. For some time, I had been feeling constricted by narrative, which has been a defining feature of so much of my work in recent years.  I often longed to unshackle myself from the tyranny of stories and instead to let colours, paint and composition evoke a thought or feeling. Then in Liverpool, my eyes fell on Bruce McLean’s Oriental Garden, Kyoto. Its abstract simplicity and clarity overwhelmed me. I think that is when a long chapter in my artistic work finally closed. Sheela/Sansun(a) is the new chapter that follows it.

Art aside, the months that followed brought personal turmoil to my life. I realise with hindsight that I’d been hesitating on the threshold for some time. After Liverpool, I used my painting as a refuge. During that time of emotional upheaval, painting became a mere physical act for me rather than a form of expression. I wasn’t satisfied with what I was producing. It was an in-between moment. These shifts in my personal life led me to better understand the impact of McLean’s painting on me. This is when my painting made a strong shift towards the abstract. Oriental Garden, Kyoto had liberated me. I felt free to approach my art as a journal that crystallises my sensations and emotions through symbols. I am freer and more sincere in these works than I’ve ever been in my art. I feel that with this exhibition, I have retrieved the joy I felt as a child when I first started drawing. I try to convey my delight in a world where every single thing is precious, with a distinct flavour and where nothing and no one is lost.

To be clearer, let me include something which John Paul Grech wrote in a piece entitled Dublin Diaries: ‘In stark contrast to his previous chapter, displayed in his impressive 2024 exhibition at the Spazju Kreattiv, Valletta, whereby Gabriel Buttigieg came full circle with his grasp over design, composition, medium and technique, this time round, he is clearly more concerned in allowing colour to dictate and determine the narrative, instead of him manipulating the medium to deliver it. I find this shift to be a captivating act of self-confidence, if there ever was one. It is an act of courage and spontaneity.’

In what ways do you believe the themes of fertility, motherhood, and gender identity resonate with contemporary audiences?

Among the many theories about the significance of the Sheela-Na-Gig, I am most drawn to those which associate her with birth and death. In medieval times, stone effigies of her would be placed over thresholds and given to women about to go into labour. Other theories link her to the Crone manifestation of the Triple Goddess. The Crone grants energy through endings, transitions and crossings from one state to another, with what we in common parlance call death. As for Sansuna, Maltese folklore casts her as a giantess of such enormous physical strength that she built Ggantija in Gozo, a megalithic structure even more ancient than Stonehenge. She intended it as a gift to the people of the island. She also gave birth to two children, half-human, half-giant. They were abducted, and she drowned swimming out after them in the Mediterranean Sea. If you distil the Sheela-Na-Gig, Sansuna, or so many other legendary or folkloric figures, the essence you extract is the same—the mother’s power and sacrifice. There’s a strong undercurrent in all these stories, which attributes the fiercest loyalty and the greatest strength to the mother not the father, whose role is reduced to that of a mere inseminator.

Can you elaborate on how elements of video games and films have influenced the visual language in your paintings?

I wouldn’t say it was a straightforward case of influence. It was a more organic process, like a diary, a sort of visual journaling. For this exhibition, I focused on three months that were crucial to me; a chapter of my life which I lived as mindfully as I could. I was intensely aware of people I encountered and experiences I lived through, which I tried to document on canvas without trying to rationalise them, but always seeking to strike an aesthetic balance. Like Sheela and like Sansuna, I tried to give birth to thoughts and intuitions which I would have formerly overlooked. The entrance of two wonderful people in my life opened new horizons for me and with their help, I’ve found myself plumbing new depths of tenderness. All this I’ve tried to transfer onto canvas.

What role does cultural diplomacy play in your exhibition, and how do you see art bridging the gap between Malta and Ireland?

Diplomacy isn’t my field, exactly. Exhibiting art in a different country throws light on shared beliefs, histories and traditions. Malta and Ireland are islands which have mirrored each other down the centuries, their identities forged by epic tales of mythological creatures, by the sea, by their perpetual occupation by foreign powers, especially their colonial experience at the hands of the British Empire, and by the dominance of the Catholic Church. National identity in both countries has been stifled and considered inferior to that of other countries but it is now flourishing. These two powerful figures in Irish and Maltese history embody this bond between the two countries, and I hope more people become aware of it through these paintings.

Looking ahead, how do you envision the evolution of your artistic practice in future exhibitions?

This was intended as a limited series. But I intend to continue exploring this style and approach, where narrative, history, mythology, folklore, symbolism, and all these academic themes take a back seat and I concentrate as much as possible on what sensory and instinctive experiences paint can kindle on canvas. This July I’m taking part in a collective exhibition in London with several international contemporary artists – I feel honoured to find myself among them. The work I’ll be sending to this exhibition will be an expression of the quintessence of freedom. I want to be free from my traditional artistic boundaries and from others’ expectations. I want it to be an artwork on my own terms.