Maltese Confabulations is a multidisciplinary exhibition by Malta-based artist Bettina Hutschek that is currently showing at Blitz, Valletta.
This show highlights the artist’s oeuvre by bringing together works from recent years. It arranges them around several recurrent motifs, such as mythology, storytelling, history and archaeology.
There is also a strong presence of Maltese heritage or ancient civilisations, including the theory that Malta was Atlantis.
Fragments of Maltese reality are interwoven in the various narrations, forming the basis for artistic storytelling and presenting a body of work that is to be understood simultaneously, not chronologically.
Hutschek’s work explores the melding of layers of ‘truth’ and ‘fiction’ in order to question ‘reality’ and ‘history’ in an absurd and ironic, however, mostly poetic way.
Through different media, the exhibition brings together work in various art forms such as documentary film, essay films, drawings, photographs and sculpture.
The installation and performance-lecture Valletta mixes legendary, factual and fictitious elements of the city’s history into a new story, developed especially for this exhibition.
The video Hubertus is a documentary portrait about the man Hubert, who is convinced that Malta was the core of the Atlantean Empire, while several other videos and photographic series bring contemporary architecture and prehistoric remains together, blurring boundaries whereby their story lines become entangled and one another.
Throughout the duration of the exhibition, a series of side events are taking place at Blitz, such as artist talks, film screenings and guided tours through the show.
The exhibition design has been constructed in collaboration with architect Tom Van Malderen.
Maltese Confabulations is also the precursor to a publication by Hutschek, to be launched early next year.
The artist lives and works in Valletta and Berlin. Her work takes on the form of essay films, fictitious documentaries, performances and works with image and text. She uses fragments of different realities to tell stories.
Maltese Confabulations is supported by the Malta Arts Fund and shows at Blitz, Valletta, until Friday.
www.bettina-hutschek.com