One Image. Many visions: So many different ways of seeing

By David ‘dp’ Attard

What happens when a photographer is asked to choose just one photograph to represent who they are as an artist? That question lies at the centre of One Image. Many Visions, a photographic exhibition bringing together twenty-five photographers based in Malta, each of whom was invited to select a single, previously unexhibited photograph that best represents their artistic vision and photographic practice.

Opened on 19 August, World Photography Day, at the Cremona Gallery within the Malta Postal Museum in Valletta, the exhibition takes a deliberately simple premise and uses it to explore something far more complex; how photographers see, interpret and ultimately define their own work.

The instruction  ‘One Photographer. One Photograph. One Artistic Statement’  places an interesting responsibility on each participant.  A photographer's practice may encompass years of work, numerous subjects and different approaches to the medium, yet here that breadth has to be distilled into one image.  The choice therefore becomes part of the work.

A photograph does not simply record what stood in front of the camera. It reflects decisions about where to stand, what to include, what to leave outside the frame, when to make the exposure and, ultimately, which image is worth showing. Photography has always occupied this space between documentation and interpretation, preserving moments while simultaneously revealing something about the person who chose to photograph them.

Rockface D’Apres Picasso by Alex Attard

‘One Image. Many Visions’ makes that act of choice particularly visible.    Rather than asking its participants to work towards a common theme, the exhibition deliberately avoids prescribing an aesthetic or subject. Documentary photography sits alongside conceptual work, intimate portraiture alongside landscape, architecture alongside street photography and fine-art approaches alongside the artistic nude. 

The resulting exhibition is not unified by a particular visual style. Its unity comes instead from the question posed to every photographer.  The interest is therefore not simply in the differences between the photographs, but in what those differences reveal.  Each image offers a particular way of looking at the world and the gallery becomes a space where those different approaches encounter one another.

One photograph may demand attention through its scale or visual intensity; another may work through quietness, ambiguity or intimacy.  Some images can be read almost immediately, while others reveal themselves more slowly. Seen together, they demonstrate that photography is not a single visual language but a remarkably broad artistic medium.

There is also an important intergenerational dimension to the exhibition. Established photographers whose work has contributed to the development of Malta's photographic landscape are presented alongside younger practitioners whose approaches reflect changing technologies, influences and visual cultures.

This continuity matters. Photography in Malta does not exist as a series of disconnected moments. E very generation inherits a visual language from those who came before, while simultaneously adapting and challenging it.  It is for this reason that the exhibition is appropriately dedicated to the pioneers of photography in Malta, both those whose names have survived and those whose identities have been lost to time. 

La Chambre Bleue Lovers by Dragana Rankovic

The twenty-five participating photographers are Martin Agius, Alex Attard, David ‘dp’ Attard, Marco Bilocca, Sarah Bonaci, Ruben Buhagiar, Stephen Buhagiar, Leonard Cocks, Johann Debono, Therese Debono, Monique Gatt, Emma Grima, Chelsea Muscat, Ed Muscat Azzopardi, Vince Piscopo, Dragana Rankovic, the late Zvezdan Reljic, Karl Sammut, Kim Sammut, Ramon Sammut, Mark Scicluna, Joseph P Smith, Sasha Vella, Elisa Von Brockdorf and Darrin Zammit Lupi.

The exhibition is accompanied by a satellite presentation in the Ellis Gallery, organised with the endorsement of the Malta Photographic Society.  Featuring work by ten members namely Bernardette Carabott, Brian Cassar, Pierre Cuschieri, Sarah Cutajar, Mario Mifsud, Jay Nabbe, Minna Palmen, Sheena Rogers, Sandra Sammut Alessi and Anna Tabone. 

The second exhibition extends the photographic conversation beyond the principal selection. Together, the two exhibitions present a broader picture of photography as a community as well as an individual practice.  Photographers with different backgrounds and approaches, connected by a continuing engagement with the medium.

A short audio-visual film by Diellza Illgner and FörsterFilm further contributes to the exhibition's exploration of photography and contemporary visual culture.

Ultimately, One Image. Many Visions does not attempt to provide a definition of what contemporary Maltese photography should be. That would contradict the very premise on which it is built.   

One Image. Many Visions is open to the public at the Malta Postal Museum, 135 Archbishop Street, Valletta, until Saturday 19 September 2026. The museum is open Monday to Friday from 10am to 4pm and on Saturdays from 10am to 2pm. Admission is free.