The recent restoration (by PrevArti) of the large painting that stands for the dome of the Gozo Cathedral of the Assumption has drawn attention to the painting itself and its artistic context.

This slim but colourful booklet attempts to describe the painting within its artistic context.

Most of the attention in local media was focused on the elaborate travel of the painting from PrevArti just outside Mosta, across the sea and up to the Victoria Cittadella where it was fixed in its place so as to be enjoyed by all.

One of the first questions many might ask is: why doesn't the Gozo Cathedral have a dome?

The author, I felt, does not give an outright answer to this and perhaps there is no real answer that can be taken out of books and discussions among the clergy.

In other cases, as we shall see, the answer was for lack of finances, but in this case there may have been another reason. The building of the church, on a design by Lorenzo Gafa, began in September 1697. But a few years earlier, on 11 January 1693, Malta was hit by a strong earthquake which affected the Mdina Cathedral which had just begun to be rebuilt and which did away with the Gozo Matrice such as existed before.

Could it be that the Church authorities in Gozo were somewhat apprehensive at building a church with a dome on such a high hill where wind, rain and the possible unsteady ground could affect the new church?

To cover up the vast hole that stood instead of a dome, the authorities, maybe following up on a suggestion by Brother Pozzo, (see later) who chose to put a trompe l'oeil, that makes a viewer think he is looking up at a dome.

This was something quite common in those Baroque times. We in Malta have some splendid examples of trompe l'oeil in the Nasoni decorations in the corridors of the Presidential Palace in Valletta.

The author gives us some examples taken from churches around Europe.

At one point, I feel, he got somewhat mixed up and confuses the Jesuit church Il Gesu with the church of St Ignatius also in Rome. The trompe oeil is in the latter, not the former.

One reason for this mix-up may be in the name of Brother Andrea Pozzo who organiseda the paintings in the church of St Ignatius. Brother Pozzo may also have been the inspiration for the Gozo trompe l'oeil, which was painted by Antonino Manuele Pippi from Messina in 1739.

Other splendid examples of trompe l'oeil, the author tells us, can be found in the Jesuit church in Vienna and that in Modena while that in the cathedral of L'Aquila was destroyed by the earthquake of 2009.

Lastly, the gecko (or lizard) that can be seen on a window pane of the fake dome - the author explains the presence of geckos in contemporary art as a quirk, maybe even a playful reference to the surname Serpotta who may have been related to artist Pippi.