I admire young entrepreneurs like Alexia Gingell Littlejohn and Rachel Said who established Gallery 23, an elegant gallery in Balzan and have kept it going, apart from a break during the lockdown. They brought the spirit of Art to Balzan just as Rudy Buhler brought it to Marsascala.  Since the lockdown they have organized two important collective exhibitions, one last year and the latest, Collectively Solo II,  is still open and closes on 21st December. It is uplifting and worth a visit. 

‘Roots of life’ by Andrew Micallef

On Friday evening Debbie Caruana Dingli's book, The School Playground, published by the enterprising Kite publications, had a soft launch there.  Debbie comes with pedigree and art runs in her DNA yet she carries it all so lightly.

Art lovers are invited to visit the gallery and meet the artist during the book signing event on Saturday 18th December from 11am till 1pm.

‘Freedom of Expression’ by Christian Formosa

'Painting was always dead,' Willem de Kooning once remarked, 'but I never let it bother me.' Well, I have no idea why he said that but it certainly bothered none of the 21 artists who are exhibiting in Balzan or the thousands who paint and exhibit all the year round. Life would be very boring indeed without art and artists, past, present and to come. It is finally culture that keeps us going.

Left: Dr Kenneth Paris and his wife Sarah and your diarist. Right: Dr Max Ganado, radio and tv personality Lea Hogg and Veronica Ganado

Left: Debbie with Gallerists Rachel and Alexia. Right: Dr Max Ganado and author Caroline Miggiani

I went from landscape to townscape; from Anna Galea's vase of flowers to Jeni Caruana's nudes, for which she is deservedly so well known; CS Lawrence's  African faces to Debbie Caruana Dingli's cartoons to Sarah Calleja's vibrant landscape, Winston Hassall's much loved townscapes and many more, each artist with their distictive brush strokes.

I must say two in particular caught my attention. One is Andrew Micallef's Roots and the other Christian Formosa's Freedom of Expression made of wood and oil colours, wax paper and so on. Both are very striking.

The exhibition was well covered in a spread in yesterday's paper. This Diary is short as I simply want to publish some of the photos taken on Friday evening to give you a taste of the ambience which was so pleasant.