James Vella Clark will be presenting his latest collection of lanscapes at Lily Agius Gallery in Sliema during a personal exhibition themed “Dead Palm Tree” which will be open for the public between the 3rd and the 24th November.

The exhibition inauguration is being supported by FFF Legal, Bank of Valletta, The Malta Independent and Marques de Casa Concha wines.

An unusual recurrent use of green tones dominates the bigger part of this collection. The composition in most paintings is still structured but forms now seem to extend more vertically and successively unlike previous patchwork. Nonetheless, the overall style remains somewhat abstracted and highly spontaneous. It is a style that can be easily defined as ‘structured abstraction’ conveying the message that whilst the artist wants to remain in control, there is a lot of ‘letting go’ thus suggesting an unusual balance between control and surrender.

Vella Clark’s landscapes retain the predominant features that have defined his work over the past years. The landscape is still dominated by the archaic church cupolas, a constant reminder of our mediterranean submissive nature to our beliefs that gives us a false sense of moral security, the colours, still mediterranean, the surface still heavily textured and the perennial palm tree, symbol of man’s spirit of perseverance amidst the different landscapes of life.

 “My first palm tree sprouted somewhere in 2008, replacing the cypress tree which had been present in many landscapes before. Since then, this detail in many of my works has redefined itself as representational of individuals in particular life-circumstances, within their own personal context. Dead Palm Tree is not about death, it’s about acknowledging that whoever we are and whatever we do, no matter how much we persevere and no matter how infallable we may think we are, we all die. And as I look at this collection and see how my style is evolving, this theme becomes also representative of the end of a phase and the birth of a new one,” explains the artist.

The exhibition will feature around 15 new pieces, most of them small in dimension but nonetheless, still very valid vehicles of self-expression and connection with the audience. “My small paintings are very intimate as they invite the viewer to move closer to the work and become part of the experience that I want to share,” concludes the artist.

JAMES VELLA CLARK

A Short Biography

Born in 1975, James Vella Clark has established himself as one of Malta’s expressionist interpreters of the Maltese urban and rural landscape.

Since his first public exhibition in 2001, his works have been gradually gaining a more abstract dimension and today, the artist’s main idiom is abstraction which lends mostly to the abstract expressionist movement of the fifties and sixties. If we could speak of a movement or school of expressionism in Malta, James Vella Clark would definitely belong to it.

The themes in his canvasses are raw, and centre round the emotion, the weakness and vulnerability of the artist. “The artist is first and foremost human and my humanity, whether in its frail and vulnerable nature, or in its inner strengths, is the central theme in most of his works.”Besides a number of solo exhibitions in Malta, James Vella Clark has held personal exhibitions in Berlin (Germany), Kampen (Netherlands), Melbourne (Australia) and New York (US). Over the years he was also invited to participate in collective exhibitions in Barcelona, Florence, Brussels, Duisburg, Vienna, Mannheim, Oostende and Paris.

In 2010, the artist hosted his first exhibition in Gozo, themed “Through Blue”, was commissioned to paint ten canvasses for the new The George Hotel in St Julian’s and in March 2011, he showed his latest series of landscapes at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Valletta. In April of that same year, the European Parliament in Brussels acquired one of James Vella Clark’s works for permanent exposition.

James Vella Clark lives and works from his studio in Valletta.

More information about the artist and his works James or view more of his work you may visit his website at www.jamesvellaclark.net