Culture | Sunday, 10 May 2009

PRINT THIS ARTICLE

The unsung Calì

On April 14, an inauguration was held for painter Guido Calì (1914 - 1975). In his speech, Nicholas de Piro outlined Calì’s achievements within the historical context under which he grew as an artist.
Guido was sixteen when his famous grandfather died in Malta in 1930. Giuseppe Calì would make the name Calì legendary. At Mosta, St Dominic’s and St Francis Churches in Valletta, more in Balzan, Lija, Sliema – almost everywhere including the magisterial palaces - his paintings were looked upon with awe and admiration. Guido’s identity would lean without effort into the art world to which his family belonged.
Both Guido’s father and mother were artists. Ugo Calì (his uncle) would go on to become an important photographer.
In 1933, at the age of 19, Guido won a scholarship from the Government School of art in Malta to study in Italy; specifically, at the famous Regia Accademia d’Arte and the much-respected British Academy of Art in Rome.
At the time, Italy was a great hub of creativity, where new fashion and innovative style was blooming out of the old baroque and more recent romantic and surrealistic movements. He saw extraordinary displays of confidence, leadership, nationalism, surrealism and futurism. Guido was twenty-five at the start of the conflagration that was World War II. There would be shortages and difficulties, but by 1945 after the end of the war, there would be a demand in Malta for replacing damaged church paintings and even a huge need of restoration. Many artists did restoration part of the time.
It is interesting to observe that as Guido developed his style, his Roman experience had properly rubbed off on him. His masterpiece depicts a serene Christ set in a landscape with challenging perspective in more than one direction. Guido’s sky is not a Giuseppe Calì sky, it is modern and inventive; Christ’s halo challenges your eyes to focus on it. Guido is here an established artist in his own right.
Biographical notes reveal that Guido worked with his father Ramiro on a number of Churches, before leaving for to the U.S., where he was commissioned to decorate the great Cathedral of Detroit. The project apparently did not materialise and he returned to Malta with a bundle of preliminary work, which he had intended for the great church.
Today, Guido’s works are mainly found in private collections and they include portraiture, landscape and religious subjects. Some of his surviving and more monumental works can be found at the Nazzareno in Sliema; St Edward’s College in Cottonera; St Catherine’s Residential Home at Attard; the St Ignatius Chapel in St Julian’s and at Gzira Parish Church. Some items did find their way abroad, and others will, from time to time, turn up at auction sales.

Any comments?
If you wish your comments to be published in our Letters pages please click button below.
Please write a contact number and a postal address where you may be contacted.

All the interviews from Reporter on MaltaToday's YouTube channel.

EDITORIAL


Italy and Malta fail

INTERVIEW