DR GIUSEPPE SCHEMBRI BONACI – a well-known artist and art lecturer at the University of Malta,
has recently published an intriguing book entitled ‘Anton Agius: Gothic Socialist Realism’ (2011).
Here he talks to Erika Brincat about the prolific sculptor Anton Agius and his work
What can you tell us about Anton Agius the sculptor?
Although I had known Anton from my youth days I met him during my Moscow long sojourn. I spent some years studying in Moscow. From that point on I became interested in his works. I was very much intrigued by his decision to opt for a realistic path in the arts and quite literally abandoning the modernist trends in art, a decision which I believe affected his already important works. In fact this new book deals with this question. He is one of the most important sculptors although his position next to the giants like Sciortino and Apap still needs to be tackled, something which also forms part of my studies. His relationship with the Labour Government during the 70s and 80s has become quite something of a legend with all anecdotes stemming from all sides and corners. One has to unveil such leaves in order to arrive at some kind of truth in all its relativity when it comes to assessing the quantity and quality of his incredible output.
Gothic Socialist Realism...
does this define his style?
Studying Agius brought me face to face with two important streams of art. The first one is the Gothic. Having studied, lived and worked in various countries and states and having a natural love towards gothic art I from time afar felt this link between many of Agius’s works and Gothic cathedrals, friezes and sculpture from Medieval Italy, France and England. This link fascinated me. The fascination grew when I sensed how he incorporated an idiom which in reality had nothing to do with such Gothic heritage, that is Socialist Realism. This art movement, a vital heir of Realism and Social Realism found its strange codification during the consolidation of the Soviet Union. It demanded total loyalty to the Communist Party of the USSR. However the basic artistic values of Socialist Realism transcended such political regimentalisation. It became an international artistic idiom. Unfortunately it was some sort of lever, a dramatic and fatal lever, against the rise of modernism and abstraction in the arts: dogmatically abstraction/modernism was considered to be a bourgeois approach in the arts and Socialist Realism its arch enemy.
What is interesting is that the Socialist Realist idiom has become a very important element in today’s strange revival of figurative art, independently of the ideology concerned or better still, independently of any ideology.
The first official principles of Socialist Realism were formulated in the 1934 Statute of the Union of Soviet Writers. The effects of these rippled outward into all other spheres of cultural creativity. They concerned all forms of artistic activity, and underlined the fact that Socialist Realism ‘demands of the artist the truthful, historically concrete representation of reality in its revolutionary development. Moreover, the truthfulness and historical concreteness of the artistic representation of reality must be linked with the task of ideological transformation and education of workers in the spirit of socialism’.
Although Agius exploits the philosophy of Socialist Realism he anchors his work in Romanesque, rather than classical imagery. This is another enigmatic paradox in Agius, since Socialist Realism in fact underpinned classical imagery, as opposed to the so-called naivety of the Gothic. This point is also discussed in my book. Anton Agius incorporates both idioms sometimes with a certain level of success and sometimes maybe with less.
The ideology of “socialist realism” urged artists to reflect in their productions as accurately as possible the spirit of the
people and their national
realities. This attempt was part of a greater scheme, that of
reinventing the nation, including its culture. Did this ideology characterise Anton
Agius’s work?
His position may well have reflected Malta’s own position at the time. Turbulent times unfolding unheard-of transformations were violently bringing forth a new Malta. The country was beginning to succeed in wedging its interests into world politics, creating more than a few international seismic points, out of proportion to its own size as an island. The Maltese nation was asserting its ‘beingness’ and its presence. Fundamental economic policies and the path towards republicanism upset traditional structures.
The attempt to convey social changes through figurative art was magnified by Agius’s energetic though sincere drive to grasp the roots of his nation-in-being, to understand the embryonic nature of Malta, and thus to fabricate its spiritual identity in form. Unfortunately this striving was weighed down by the dangerous concessions he made. He believed that modernist and abstract art is not capable of reflecting these tremendous changes. He thought that abstract art is an art that practically goes against the formation of such spiritual identity. He changed gear. It is true that after some time he did give important nods back to abstraction although I have my doubts as to the consistency of such works.
He wanted to align himself with the working class movement, and demanded that his works should have a clear, comprehensible message: “‘I want my life to be understood through art ... abstract art proved inadequate for this.”
Which are the sculptures he is most renowned for ?
It is at this moment in his career that he created the bulk of his social/political works: Manwel Dimech, Monument to the Worker 1960, Freedom Monument 1979, Dun Mikiel Xerri u Shabu, Sette Giugno 1919, Francis Ebejer, Guze Ellul Mercer, Mikiel Anton Vassalli, Lorry Sant, all form part of Agius’s social/socialist realist oeuvre. Agius identified himself with this class position not only theoretically but also materially, by including himself in the form of a self-portrait on many of his political monuments.
As Louis P. Saliba remarks, “Anton’s features are again seen in the Sette Giugno 1919 monument. Again, he is part of the heroic sacrifice, protesting against the historical dockyard charges, rising prices and incomplete political autonomy in local affairs. But his is also a protest against the injustice of life, against hypocrisy, the (apparent) injustice of God.”
He has created important and beautiful monuments such as Manwel Dimech in Valletta, while The Kiss in Rabat is horrendous. In my opinion even Msida’s Workers Monument is an unfortunate compromise – half of it is really incredible whereas the part above, that is the family, is rather dissonant, weak and clichè. Manwel Dimech monument is much more successful.
It epitomises Dimech’s struggle for the birth of an industrial, independent and progressive Malta. He in fact is depicted clothed as an upcoming citizen with his hat as a symbol of the emerging middle class. This was in fact Manwel Dimech’s dream – the struggle against poverty and the transformation of an enslaved working class into one strong cultured entrepreneurial republican-socialistic middle class. Here the artist managed well to convey his message. Another of Agius’s beautiful works in my opinion is the sculpture of St Francis which can be found at the Peace Lab. I believe this is one of his most successful works.
What led you to publish this illustrated book about Anton Agius’s sculptures?
Modestly enough I am trying to introduce an important analytical critical approach in the study of Maltese art. I believe this is unfortunately lacking when it comes to modern and contemporary art.
Anton Agius is acknowledged as one of the most renowned sculptors of Malta although perhaps not as great as Sciortino and Apap who were artistically stronger, and this book is an artistic analysis of his work.
This publication forms part of a series of research works. Other research monographs include: Cremona, Apap and St Paul Iconography, Apap and the Descent from the Cross, Two Painters: Velázquez-Picasso—Las Meninas and others. The next publication in print is Antonio Sciortino and the British Academy of Arts in Rome.
In Professor Mario Buhagiar’s words “the work is a thought provoking monograph on a prolific and versatile artist whose multifaceted work is replete with contradictions. This essay is a poignant first analysis of a sculptor who dominated the art scene in Malta in the second half of the 20th century.”
‘Anton Agius and Gothic Socialist Realism’
Published by Horizons, Price €15 is available in leading Agenda bookstores
Dr Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci studied Philosophy, Law and the Arts. He graduated from the University of Malta, from the State University of Kiev, and from the State University of Moscow, and undertook post-graduate research studies at the State University of Milan. Besides lecturing in Modern and Contemporary art, Fine Arts and Art Theory at the University of Malta, he has exhibited his own artistic works in Malta, Paris, Lyon, Stuttgart, Regensburg, Moscow, Petrozavodsk, and Canberra. He has led and participated in various art workshops in France, Bulgaria, Germany, Moscow and Australia.
Anton Agius was a veteran artist with a deep sympathy and compassion for the have-nots, for those less fortunate. He was born in Rabat in 1933 and was brought up in the workshops of woodcarvers. Initially he was guided by Samuel Bugeja and Guzeppi Galea. Ignazio Cefai and George Borg polished further the young man’s talent. In 1957 he won a scholarship to study in Rome under Pericle Fazzini and Michele Guerrisi.
Later he studied in London under Frank Martin, Elizabeth Frink, Anthony Caro and Eduardo Paolozzi. He returned to Malta full of admiration for Henry Moore.
When Anton returned from his studies in London in 1961, the island was witnessing a frenetic infrastructural change previous to independence. A fairly large number of olive trees were uprooted to create space for extension works at the airport. Anton realised the potential of such a medium and on the advice of his English tutor sought to exploit it to the fullest. He attacked the roots of alive trees with such fury and frenzy that eventually we came to associate his name to sculpture in olive wood, especially the interpretation of knotted olive wood roots, tortuous and tortured. He carved wood and a niche for himself in Maltese contemporary art.
He was considered as nature’s poet and had a large collection of birds, animals and fish sculpted in olive wood. A choice collection of this series can be viewed in a permanent display in the spacious corridors of the Cathedral Museum, Mdina.
The artist treated olive wood with great respect. He hardly changed the form or nature of the trunk or log, but preferred to observe it at length and allow it to inspire, suggest and guide him in his interpretation. With great patience and perseverance he brought out its essence, its soul or spirit and it was usually the nature of the trunk that determined the final result. He died aged 74 in 2008.
(Artist’s Bio written by E.V. Borg).