To enter the charmed world of Kenneth Zammit Tabona’s watercolours has been described as living through a nostalgic dream; an atmospheric glimpse of a crystallised moment in time full of jewel-like colours that dazzle like watery satins and that soothe like rich velvets.
Fearful Symmetries, an exhibition of 32 watercolours at the Maltese Embassy in Paris, consist of a homogenous collection of very particular interiors with still lifes and windows through which landscapes stretch infinitely. These fuoridentros or dentrofuoris; a tongue-in-cheek interpretation of “rooms with a view” coined by Professor Peter Serracino Inglott, with their ubiquitous chequered floors, Chinese vases and arum lilies have been described by fellow artist Carol Jaccarini as “a visual kind of magical realism where reality is combined with fantasy; where the seemingly unreal or improbable is given life and everyday happenings are transformed into dreams wherein elements of mythology, dream or fairy story combines effortlessly with the everyday in a complex mosaic”.
Writing in Mr Zammit Tabona’s exhibition catalogue, Professor Mario Buhagiar describes him as “Malta’s poet of the brush”, whose “gouaches and watercolours have a melodic quality that reflects his thirst after beauty and sophisticated refinement.
“Their exquisite delicacy bestows them a tender endearing charm. They are also erudite, and reflect, in addition to his love for things Maltese, his passion for music and literature.”
Prof. Buhagiar explains how “Malta’s rural and urban landscape, and the richness of its history and traditions, are central to Mr Zammit Tabona’s art, and he has masterfully synthesised them with his passion for fine fabrics, Chinese Porcelain, armchairs with embroidered rests and backs, furniture, arum lilies and bird of paradise flowers, and so many other of the fine things in life”.
His “paintings have the taste and smell of Malta. They lay bare the soul of a proud island state whose strategic location in the centre of the Middle Sea exposed it to variegated and often conflicting cultural cross currents”.
• Fearful Symmetries runs until July 29 at the Maltese Embassy in Paris.