The exhibition "...the struggle seems to be eternal" Alfred Chircop: Paintings, prints, drawings delves into Maltese modern artist Alfred Chircop's (1933-2015) struggle with opposing dialectics such as peripheral/central, figurative/abstract and physical/spiritual. The eternal struggle is the leitmotif of the exhibition and the ethos of Chircop's oeuvre. This struggle is also palpable in the recreated studio, which serves as a focal point of the exhibition, where viewers can engage with Chircop's creative space and contemplate his last painting resting on the easel.
Divided into four thematic, non-chronological sections, the exhibition highlights Chircop's personal artistic journey and situates him within the broader context of notable 20th century Maltese artists. These thematic subdivisions provide an opportunity to trace Chircop's stylistic evolution, offering a dual-lens that allows his work to be both contextualised and stylistically explored.
Wearing the outside in is the title of the first section. It deals with portraiture of artists and their family members, but it also displays an array of different styles, from traditional approaches to other modern, more abstract techniques that depart from photographic accuracy. In Portrait of the artist's father (1959), Chircop breaks down the human head into a series of cubes parallelling Frank Portelli's experimentation with crystallised Cubism in My Life (1954). In Ecce Homo (1993), Chircop distorts his Christ doppelganger to heighten its expressiveness, and this could be confronted with Preghiera (1982) by Antoine Camilleri who often expressionistically appropriated the image of Christ into his own likeness. If Self-Portrait in a tie (1952) reveals the mimetic naturalism of Chircop's early academic training in Malta, his later Self-Portrait (2000), executed in the abstracted gestural style of his later period, reflects the evolution of his artistic style. This initial section thus functions as an effective introduction to the artist on both a personal and artistic level.
The second section entitled, Across the cultural divide, focuses on the freedom and experimentation Chircop experienced during his one-year course (1960-1961) at Bath Academy, which had relocated to Corsham Court. Unlike the traditional academic training in Malta and Italy, the English academy encouraged a geometric impulse towards abstraction. At Corsham Court, Chircop had surely realised that the modern artist could no longer express his age in the old forms of the Renaissance. He understood that the modern artist must convey an inner world, its energy, motion and other inner forces, expressing feelings rather than merely illustrating them.
The English experience thus marked an important turning point in Chircop's artistic career leaving a lasting imprint on his oeuvre. In this section, Chircop is significantly placed in dialogue with a geometric sculpture by Toni Pace, Crescent Moons (1960s). Pace, who also attended Bath Academy, was another Maltese artist who radically departed from the Italian influence that had shaped Maltese art for centuries and boldly took the path of abstraction in sculpture. Unlike Pace, however, who after a brief two-year period returned to a traditional-oriented path that was more easily accepted within the Maltese artistic scene, Chircop embraced abstract art as his enduring credo.
The third section entitled, Between figuration and abstraction, functions as a prelude to the final section that marks Chircop's total abandonment of recognisable subject matter. This section deals with the liminal space between the figurative and the abstract, showcasing works that are abstracted yet still retain a resemblance to natural objects. Although these works depict outer appearances of nature, their style foretells Chircop's mature predilection for abstraction.
The works vary in their degree of abstraction, ranging from those maintaining a strong connection with the representational to those nearly abandoning it altogether. In this section, the works placed in dialogue with Chircop's that most radically abandon the representational are Esprit Barthet's Abstracted Nude (1959) and Harry Alden's Tree Trunk (1990) offering an interesting confrontation with Chircop's Untitled (1960?) in which the starting point is no longer recognisable, thus preparing the ground for what will ultimately define Chircop's mature style.
Wassily Kandinsky was the first to articulate a modern spirituality completely detached from traditional religious iconography, exploiting the formal elements of art to evoke an inner response that elevates the viewer toward a spiritual experience. In the final section of this exhibition, Through matter the spirit, we see Chircop pursuing a similar endeavour. This section occupies almost half the exhibition space and hosts mainly the artist's later large-scale paintings. Although the viewer may find vernacular decorative references, such as lavish Baroque festa decorations and colourful fireworks displays, in his large-scale paintings Chircop was painting independently of subject matter.
Through a controlled yet dynamic montage of elements, such as lines, marks, shapes and colour, Chircop orchestrates a complex interplay of forces that imbue his works with a deep spiritual resonance. There is an element of energy and motion in this orchestration, rendering the creative process perhaps of more significance than the finished painting itself. These large-scale paintings thus invite us into a metaphysical journey from chaos to order, with the artist acting as a mediator of form in a continuous philosophical inquiry into the very nature of existence itself. The struggle to find a balance between order and chaos, between form and formlessness, represents Chircop's most significant struggle and his philosophical manifesto.
In this section, the most significant artists placed in dialogue with Chircop are Victor Pasmore, Emvin Cremona, Josef Kalleya and Gabriel Caruana. The influence of Pasmore is clearly visible in Chircop's series of etchings and aquatints. While the dialogue with his tutor Cremona is visual and decorative, the confrontation with both Kalleya and Caruana is more indirect. The dialogue between these artists is less explicit in visual terms and, rather than in surface aesthetics, is found instead in their gestural approach where meaning arises from traces of the creative process.
Chircop's eternal struggle is Sisyphean in nature, and necessarily so. The viewer is immediately made aware that the pieces presented in this exhibition are only the relics of that struggle. From the video documentary included in the exhibition, it clearly emerges that Chircop did not want to explain his paintings. He preferred them to be silently contemplated. Maltese philosopher Peter Serracino Inglott hoped that paintings like Chircop's might one day find their place inside Maltese churches for contemplation - a vision that, unfortunately, never came to fruition. However, one could easily imagine Chircop's awe-inspiring paintings placed in a chapel as spaces for meditation, offering art as a form of spirituality.
The doubt as to whether such relics could indeed go beyond surface aesthetics to convey something about God and the human condition would continue to haunt the artist until the very end. What is undeniable, however, is that Chircop succeeded in forging a unique stylistic language - one that was deeply personal and truly contemporary.
"...the struggle seems to be eternal" Alfred Chircop: Paintings, prints, drawings is open until 3 November at Space A, Spazju Kreattiv and is curated by Christian Attard, Mark Sagona and Charlene Vella.
It is being organised by The Alfred Chircop Trust in collaboration with the Department of Art and Art History at the University of Malta and as part of the Spazju Kreattiv 2024-2025 programme. The exhibition is supported by Visit Malta, Farsons Foundation, DB Foundation, Prevarti art conservation and restoration, Mapfre MSV Life and Heritage Malta.
The exhibition catalogue will be launched on 24 October at 7pm at Spazju Kreattiv
