Photo: Dr Mark Sagona (second from right), together with (from left): Dr Christian Attard, Prof. Keith Sciberras, publisher Mr Joseph Mizzi, and contributors Francesca Balzan and Jessica Muscat.
The Department of Art and Art History in the Faculty of Arts at the University of Malta has recently launched the new publication International Perspectives on the Decorative Arts: Nineteenth-century Malta. The volume is edited by Dr Mark Sagona, academic member in the same department, and published by Midsea Books. It is the first volume in a series of peer-reviewed publications exclusively dedicated to the Decorative Arts in Malta, and forms an integral part of the long-term strategy of the Department in its study of the Decorative Arts on the island within their larger Mediterranean and international contexts, under the direction of Dr Sagona. This book is published in collaboration with the Osservatorio per le Arti Decorative in Italia Maria Accascina of the Universita’ degli Studi di Palermo, one of the most prominent centres for the study of the Decorative Arts in Italy.
The volume results from the first conference on the Decorative Arts organised by Dr Mark Sagona and Dr Roberta Cruciata from the Universita degli Studi di Palermo held at the Istituto Italiano di Cultura in Valletta in May 2019. It brings together the newly-edited and amplified proceedings of the conference and includes five papers relating to the production of the Decorative Arts in Malta in the very productive years of the nineteenth century. It includes studies by Alaine Apap Bologna, Francesca Balzan, Jessica Muscat, Dr Cruciata and Dr Sagona, and carries an introduction by Prof. Maria Concetta Di Natale, one of the most important names on the subject in Italy. The subjects include silver, jewellery, marble-mosaic and ornamental drawings.
The book launch was held on Monday 6 December 2021 at the Aula Prima and Ä ibsoteka of the Valletta University Campus. Prof. Keith Sciberras, Head of Department, led the proceedings, while fellow department member Dr Christian Attard discussed the academic, aesthetic and technical merits of the volume. Dr Mark Sagona delivered an overview on the importance of the Decorative Arts in Malta as a main pillar of artistic production on the island, and the objectives of the new series of publications within the remit of the Department’s art-historical research.
Dr Mark Sagona (left), editor and contributor and the Book (right)
