The Art Discussion Group will be holding its 160th meeting tomorrow at 7.30pm at Balzan parish centre.

Artist Ray Piscopo will be meeting members and friends to discuss his work, vision and concept behind his new creations, themed Social & Modern, currently exhibited at Dar Qalb ta’ Ġesu in Santa Venera.

You Cannot Change Destiny

Piscopo, who is intrigued by dynamic movement, intense colour, drama and order, says: “In life I express myself by creating order and rationality in my world. Since engineering is my profession, such discipline has moulded my outlook on life in a linear and regimented structure. My experience has been transformed into a series of events forming compartments or sections, so I try to break established rules and boundaries by being non-conformist. Total adherence to entrenched ideas only creates clinical art. My works are bold excursions into the unknown.”

Piscopo’s work is easily recognisable by the force within, usually a mass or crowd of struggling figures vying for attention and importance, as in real life. Man/woman grow in itimate realationship with others or with a chosen companion. The greater the relationships, the more change and growth.

This is the only education, the growth in a group – termed the ‘education of life’. Learning by rote or by heart and its artifical examination only leads to a dead end, to frustration. What we learn by heart is quickly forgotten and is different from learning through experience or contact, which heals and nourishes.

Follow the Light is a practical example of Piscopo’s vision or concept as a palliative medium for those who are suffering. The bright light in the painting is the source of hope, of courage towards a brighter future. For those who seek the ‘light’ there is always hope.

In the painting the figures are constricted into a small space with very little breathing space left in the composition. This intensifies the atrocious pain felt by the protagonists that compete for the  intense light showered on them as healing therapy. The artist is seeking a spiritual ideal and concludes that physical well-being is only derived through such ideals.

Piscopo studied in the early 1970s under Antoine Camilleri (1922-2005) and attended life classes for three years under the supervision of Anton Calleja (b. 1955), who regards the human figure as an essential tool in academic training. 

He also attended Luciana Notturni’s workshop on mosaics in Ravenna, Italy. For three years Piscopo also attended classes at the Mosta Institute of Arts and Design in ceramics under the tutorship of George Muscat.

For more information visit www.adgmalta.webs.com.