A new exhibition of hand-built sculptural ceramics and acrylic paintings, Essence of Gozo by artist Jane Birchall, in ArtHall, Victoria, was inspired by Gozo’s rugged coastline and the crystal clear waters of the Mediterranean.
Curated by ArtHall gallerist Marta Obiols Fornell, this is Birchall’s first solo exhibition on the island, and in addition to celebrating the raw beauty of the land and sea, Essence of Gozo also includes a site-specific installation to highlight the growing impact of man-made debris on Gozo’s coastal scenery.
In wonderful natural colours and organic shapes, it’s thus an exhibition of dichotomies: from sea blue hues set to the golds of sand and stone, from smoothly reflective waters to frothy white, and from the patterns of pock-marked coralline rock to the scoop of vanilla globigerina limestone.
It’s also a fluid exhibition, in that the collection on show will change throughout the month, and if you visit twice, you might expect to see something different.
A glossy moon jar titled Ġojjell Moħbi (The Hidden Gem) places Gozo in abstracted form at the heart of the show, its surface decoration hinting at a coarse pearly white landmass beneath a glaze of cobalt blue, a foaming ocean spilling across the ceramic surface.
Birchall describes how her process is intuitive – as she pinches, and moulds, her forms take shape influenced by the landscape around her.
“As I was texturing and glazing this piece, I could almost see the heel of Italy, Sicily and then Gozo, emerging,” Jane smiles.
A second large moon jar is, in contrast, decidedly earthy. Sculpted from textured black clay with a crater-like rough sandstone glaze, this piece was inspired by the ash-black land left after farmers burn the fields, stark against snaking rubble walls, represented by the vessel’s textured sandstone lip.
Other works include a trio of frilled coral sculptural candlesticks, pinched cylinders in sea blue, emerald green and sunset pink, and Delph, a large vessel which has ‘grown’ wings pinched from the clay. This almost figurative form emerges from the shimmering blues of a purposefully translucent glaze as if water is slipping over its surface.
“Sometimes you see shocking pollution along the shore”
Nearby, Sirena is an almost heart-shaped female form with a pearlised, iridescent glaze who appears to have stepped from the landscape both textured yet sleek and tactile, while Manta is a glossy undulating platter in white with blue. Evocative of the shape of a manta ray, it balances upon three gilded feet like crusty barnacles.
“As I formed, pinched and textured this, it seemed to take on a life of its own,” Birchall continues.
She explains that she uses the actual form of the rocks to texture her work. Mindful of the ethos ‘take nothing but photos, leaving nothing except footprints’, she carries her clay to the bay to take an impression (with a layer of cling-film between the clay and the rock).
Look out too for three works from a feast collection made from homely terracotta which brings, gently, the people from the islands into the exhibition. A celebration of festival fireworks, these have a dark brown-red exterior; inside explosions of blue are set against a mirror-like obsidian.
Abstracted human forms also make an appearance in one of Birchall’s abstracted paintings of Xlendi, the suggestion of a conversation in a boathouse while other works were painted to complement individual ceramic pieces.
After the exhibition’s initial impression of purity and beauty, the installation at the back of the gallery is more sobering.
“Sometimes you see shocking pollution along the shore,” says Birchall, “and I’m often taken aback by the litter washed up in my favourite spot, Xwejni Bay. I took photos thinking they might inspire a clean-up, but Marta and I realised that they are still beautiful despite the rubbish. The installation will highlight the concept of pollution – which is a burning issue − within the island’s beauty.”
It comprises a column of small canvas panels, in heavily textured with swirling paint like frosted icing alongside the gallery’s well which is full of old fishing paraphernalia and plastic waste beneath a kinetic ceramics piece.
On the other side, burnt parchment printed with these photos hang on scorched wooden panels. On closer inspection, the more evident the pollution between the stones becomes: you’re encouraged to look deeper and question what you see.
These issues are also addressed in Birchall’s experimental abstract Flotsam and Jetsam, a mysterious and chaotic work with underlying metallic gold leaf rectangles beneath the thickly-textured yet translucent layers of acrylic.
“The shapes represent unknown objects emerging from the depths of the sea which could be ancient treasures or a fridge door dumped from the cliffs,” she adds. “Hopefully showing the ugly alongside the beauty will make people think about how we can confront this problem on our shores.”
Essence of Gozo is on display at ArtHall in Victoria until May 31.
