Giovanni Bonello:
Robert Caruana Dingli – Letters, Caricatures and Other Works.
Fondazzjoni Patrimonju Malti, 2016,
Hardbound, 364 pp.

I first came across the name of Robert Caruana Dingli (1882-1940) when, as a 10-year-old schoolboy, I was fascinated by his illustrations for one of my favourite textbooks, namely Mgr Salv Laspina’s Outlines of Maltese History which, ironically, was first published three years after the artist’s death. He also provided illustrations for another textbook – E.B. Vella’s Ġabra ta’ Ward, a series of Maltese short stories – and for the Melita Readers.

Caruana Dingli’s graphic and vivid depiction of various episodes, characters and battle scenes lit up my youthful imagination and helped instil in me a love of history – and art – which, thankfully, has never left me.

This handsome, lavishly illustrated book by Giovanni Bonello is divided into three sections: the first consists of an introduction by the author examining the letters which the artist wrote to the author’s father, Vincenzo Bonello (1891-1969), the eminent art historian, museum curator and architectural designer, and an artist in his own right.

This is followed by three studies on Robert Caruana Dingli by Petra Caruana Dingli, on his art and its development, by Anastasia Anastasi Vella, and on Caruana Dingli’s cartoons by Ġorġ Mallia.

The second section contains 38 letters which Robert wrote (in English) to Vincenzo Bonello from London between June 1914 and April 1915, while the third section reproduces 67 letters (mostly undated) which the artist wrote to Bonello from Gozo between 1921 and 1924.

The Caruana Dingli family bred a number of leading artists, but in many cases mention of Caruana Dingli today is more likely to refer to Robert’s elder brother Edward, a successful portraitist possessing great technical skills who could count on the support of the pro-British establishment. Robert had a greater affinity with the pro-Italian elements of Maltese society who certainly could not match the other side in terms of patronage.

Bonello describes Edward’s art as “refined, elegant shallowness” and his scenes of Maltese life devoid of social conscience. Edward, who broke up with his wife and settled down with his friend’s wife, refused Church commissions. Robert, on the other hand, eagerly took them up. He also made a name for himself as an excellent, mordant caricaturist who even ventured into Cubism. Edward, on the other hand, stuck to the old school, and ignored 20th-century artistic trends.

No wonder relations between the two brothers were not exactly fraternal. Robert was highly critical of his brother’s work and probably envious of his commercial success.

Both were students of Giuseppe Calì (1846-1930), a towering figure of the Maltese art scene, but whereas Edward respected him, Robert held him in contempt.

Although he found a job at the General Post Office, Robert soon gave that up to concentrate on developing his artistic skills. In 1907 he drew a series of caricatures of leading personalities and was eventually commissioned by London Opinion to draw a series of cartoons which were published in 1908, and also had his work published in Punch and Tatler. In London, he was commissioned to illustrate advertisements for, among others, Pears soap. (He kept up his advertising activity until years later, including a series for Cisk beers and Colombos cigarettes).

Robert returned to Malta in 1913. However, a year later he again went to London, this time for a distinct purpose, of which more later.

Robert’s very close friendship with the art critic Vincenzo Bonello, who was nine years younger, had started a few years earlier. What brought them together, according to Bonello’s son Giovanni, was “a fanatic worship of art and a resistance to colonial servitude”. Vincenzo became Robert’s closest confidant, as the copious correspondence reproduced in this book testifies, and into which he poured “all his heartaches, his ambitions, his defeats, his angers”.

Vincenzo made it a habit of keeping all the letters he received, including from other artists like Giorgio Preca, Edward Caruana Dingli, George Borg, Anton Inglott, Antonio Sciortino and Emvin Cremona, and from art historians, local and foreign personalities and politicians, but there is no trace of his letters to Robert.

Robert moved to London in June 1914 in the hope of selling a portrait (purportedly of the Turkish general Dragut, according to Vincenzo Bonello) which he was convinced was by Rembrandt, even though it had no pedigree. He had bought it for £19 from Mgr Carmelo Bologna.

His efforts to sell the painting for at least £10,000 (a huge sum then), seeing he was constantly in need of money, sapped his energy, and eventually proved fruitless. (In 1935 Robert loaned it to the Museum of Art in Valletta where Vincenzo was curator, but refused to sell it to the government in exchange for property. It was still unsold when the artist, a heavy smoker, died of lung cancer on February 18, 1940, aged 51.)

Though he repeatedly urged Vincenzo to join him in London to share his experiences of the rich and varied British art scene, he soon realised that the outbreak of the First World War a few months later made this practically impossible. Unable to afford to stay in London any longer, Robert returned to Malta in May 1915 and decided to earn some money by giving lessons.

Eventually Robert, who married Carmela Aquilina in 1916, moved to Gozo where he received various commissions for church paintings. Gozo, it turned out, was deceptively bucolic and the bitter rivalry between and within parishes, and between the various artists engaged to carry out church commissions, was constantly boiling below the surface.

His caricatures were imbued with a sense of humour

Meanwhile, Robert continued to produce caricatures for The Malta Punch, though he constantly complained to Vincenzo that he was not being paid in full or in time for them. An ardent supporter of Nerik Mizzi, whose Partito Democratico Nazionalista won all four Gozo seats in the first general election held under the 1921 self-government Constitution, his favourite targets were Sir Gerald (later Lord) Strickland, leader of the pro-British Constitutional Party, and his deputy, Dr (later Sir) Augustus Bartolo. Yet his caricatures were imbued with a sense of humour.

Indeed, he also showed this sense of humour in his sacred art, such as in Munxar parish church where he depicted himself and his wife as two souls in Purgatory.

Petra Caruana Dingli says Robert had embarked on a constant search for improved technique in art and passed this on to his students, who included Anton Inglott, Emvin Cremona, Giuseppe Arcidiacono, Josef Kalleya and Esprit Barthet. Although of a reclusive character, unlike his brother Edward, Robert enjoyed the company of friends.

Caruana Dingli traces the artist’s family tree back to Giuseppe Caruana Dingli (1765-1801), son of Francesco Caruana and Giovanna Dingli. One of Giuseppe’s sons was Ferdinand, Robert’s grandfather.

In 1915, following the International Eucharistic Congress held in Malta two years earlier, Robert and Vincenzo Bonello were both made members of the committee for the erection of a monument to Christ the King by Antonio Sciortino, erected in Floriana.

In 1921 Robert moved to Gozo, where he earned many commissions for church paintings, but some years later, reacting angrily after quarrelling with some priests regarding payment for a painting at Ta’ Pinu basilica, he slashed the painting and thenceforth refused to do any further work for churches, left Gozo and went to live in Sliema.

The astonishing range of Robert’s art – including etchings, book illustrations, political caricatures, watercolours, oil paintings, altarpieces and church vault decorations – is analysed by Anastasia Anastasi Vella, who notes that the artist had a particular passion for landscapes; indeed he produced some beautiful, evocative Maltese landscapes, which can be counted among his best works. He was also receptive to European influences, such as the Macchiaoli, although he confessed he was not impressed by Cubism.

Anastasi Vella discusses in some detail Robert’s graphic works; his sacred art for, among others, the Gozitan parish churches of Xagħra, Kerċem, Żebbuġ, Fontana and Munxar, and Ta’ Pinu basilica; his portraits – for which, admittedly, Edward was better known – which included an outstanding one of Dr Enrico Mizzi, but mainly of himself and his family; and genre scenes, in which he was extremely versatile and prodigiously prolific.

Ġorġ Mallia – who for several years contributed weekly strip cartoons for this newspaper – discusses Robert’s cartoons and political caricatures and gives a detailed description of their content and intended meaning, his favourite targets, as already noted, being Gerald Strickland and Augustus Bartolo.

Robert’s 38 letters to Vincenzo from London (a couple of originals are used to illustrate this section), written in English, are mostly signed off by “Ruy Moreno”, the alias he uses to keep his whereabouts secret. He constantly asks Vincenzo – whom he describes as his “only true friend” and for whom he expresses his “spiritual love” – what people in Malta were saying about his “Rembrandt”. He also enthusiastically recounts his visits to the Tate and the National Gallery, where he admires works by Turner and Corot, describing their techniques, while at the same time constantly disparaging Calì.

Indeed, Robert writes more frequently to Vincenzo than to his own family, although he never fails to ask him to convey his best wishes to his father Raphael and to his sisters (but pointedly not to his brother Edward). He constantly urges Vincenzo to join him in England so they can savour the vibrant art scene together, saying he would try to find him a job as an art restorer.

At one stage Robert reveals that he was offered £7,000 for his ‘Rembrandt’ (which some experts had attributed to Ferdinand Bol, a disciple of the great Dutch master) but he refused to part with it for less than £10,000. Yet the outbreak of war dashed all his hopes of selling it at that price.

These themes recur constantly in Robert’s letters. He opens his heart to his friend ‘Bonell’ about his moods and anxieties. He constantly harps on how he often finds himself penniless, and asks Vincenzo to get his father Raphael to send him money. The letters in fact bring out Robert’s restless character.

On April 25, 1915, he writes that he had decided to leave England because he had no money left, and obviously because his ‘Rembrandt’ mission had failed. He arrived in Malta on May 15 after a week’s voyage aboard the P&O liner Arabia.

Robert wrote the 67 letters to Vincenzo, reproduced in the third section and all but a few in Maltese (transcribed, not always correctly, into modern orthography) mostly from Gozo, whence he had moved late in 1921. He was commissioned to carry out paintings for Xaghra collegiate church after the archpriest (Fr Maurizio Cauchi) had seen his work for St George’s basilica. Calì’s paintings had disappointed the archpriest and the parishioners and Robert could not agree more, strengthening his poor opinion of Calì and of fellow artist Gianni Vella (1885-1977), both of whose work at the Gozo Cathedral he criticises in rather vulgar terms. Robert maintains that, unlike these two, he always insisted on being a free hand and not made to bow to popular tastes, although he later admits that he had to change his mind.

In his letters Robert expresses his admiration for Enrico Mizzi, whose party had swept Gozo in the first parliamentary elections in 1921, and his antipathy for Strickland and Bartolo, the butt of his cartoons in the Malta Punch.

Robert’s commissions for Gozo churches came thick and fast, to the extent that he could hardly cope with an important commission to depict prehistoric Malta for the Empire Exhibition in London in 1924.

The artist constantly urges Vincenzo to write favourable reviews of his work and frequently asks him to chase the editor of The Malta Punch for payment, to buy canvas and colouring materials. He also badgers him to review his work because despite the healthy number of sacred art commissions, he complains that because of the widespread poverty in Gozo, it is difficult for him to get paid on time. Nevertheless he says he is widely popular in Gozo, though not in Malta where he had many “enemies”.

In almost every letter, Robert pleads with Vincenzo to visit him in Gozo, offering him accommodation in his house, so that he could see the work he was carrying out for himself. He is especially proud of the altarpiece depicting St Paul landing in Malta which he carried out for Munxar parish church. He is also enthusiastic about his work for Fontana parish church.

Robert frequently discusses technique with Vincenzo but even more frequently disparaging Gianni Vella and seeking Vincenzo’s support in gaining a teaching job in Gozo.

In 1923 Robert won a case instituted against him by Mgr Carmelo Bologna from whom he bought the portrait he deemed was by Rembrandt. This case had dragged on for years. Though the painting’s provenance was unclear, Robert insisted it was the gift of a French ambassador to a 17th century French consul in Malta, which was left behind by the Knights when they were expelled by Napoleon in 1798.

Eventually Robert left Gozo and went to live in Sliema, where he taught art at the Sacred Heart school, and later at the Government School of Art where he became assistant director.

The tone of most of Robert’s letters is frank, and occasionally quite vulgar, as already noted, which in itself is an indication of the closeness in which he held the younger Vincenzo. He complains bitterly about the envy shown towards him by some fellow artists which even led them to invent things about him.

Yet Robert’s letters are invaluable in that they also throw a light on what was happening on the art scene both locally and in England, thus helping to better understand the prevailing cultural scene at the time.

This outstanding publication is generously illustrated with scores of photographs of the artist and of his works – landscapes, portraits, sacred art, cartoons, caricatures, advertisements, everyday scenes – which amply show the wide gamut of his art. Incidentally, two of the works depicted – Sea Inlet and Gypsy Camp – have just come up for auction.

I am confident that Robert Caruana Dingli: Letters, Caricatures and Other Works will help to give this intriguing and prolific artist the proper recognition he deserves.