More than half a million people will have the opportunity to soak up a dose of Maltese history and culture as they visit the 2017 Biennale Arte in Venice.
The Malta Pavilion is the nation's first in 17 years and features works by contemporary artists as well as historic artefacts divided into 19 chapters.
Chapters take in specimens of natural history, a national genome, an ancient shipwreck, migration, cartography, ritualistic objects, transgender characters and other artefacts.
Venice's Biennale was founded more than 120 years ago and is now one of the most famous and prestigious cultural organisations in the world, attracting more than 500,000 visitors every year.
Held every other year - hence its name - the Venice Biennale has served as a blueprint for other such biannual cultural exhibitions around the globe.
This year's edition, the 57th, is titled VIVA ARTE VIVA and is being curated by Christine Macel. It features 120 artists from 51 countries, as well as 85 national participations, with Antigua and Barbuda, Kiribati, Nigeria participating for the first time.
Doors will open to the public this coming Saturday May 13 and the exhibition will run until November 26.
Malta's exhibition, titled Homo Melitensis: An incomplete history in 19 chapters, was co-curated by Bettina Hutschek and Raphael Vella and officially inaugurated by Malta's ambassador to Italy Vanessa Frazier and Arts Council Malta executive chair Albert Marshall.
“We lobbied hard to return to Venice and we secured investment through public and private support," said Mr Marshall, who thanked the Culture and Finance ministries for their support and said that Arts Council Malta wanted to build on momentum "to ensure that artistic works of excellence have access to other international platforms."
Italian film star Maria Grazia Cucinotta, famous for her roles in films such as Il Postino and James Bond flick The World is Not Enough, was a special guest at the inauguration of the Malta Pavilion.
Check out some of the Malta Pavilion exhibits in the photos below.
Pia Borg: Still from Silica, 2017. Video, 22 min.
Maurice Tanti Burlò (1936-2014): Stairway to Heaven 2006. Cartoon showing overbuilding in Malta
Karine Rougier: Horses dream, 2015. Gouache on vintage document, 16.5 x 14.5 cm. Private collection.
The Unwanted by Joe Sacco, published in the Virginia Quarterly Review in two parts in the winter 2010 and spring 2010 issues.
David Pisani:138, Strait street, Valletta 2000, from the collection Vanishing Valletta. Selenium and gold toned chlorobromide gelatin silver print, 29 x 23.8 cm