No Skira Experiments in Love and Revolution Paperback

In 2026, the Malta Pavilion will show the work of a trio of multidisciplinary artists with complementary per­spectives: Adrian MM Abela, Charlie Cauchi and Raphael Vella. Titled No Need to Sparkle and curated by Margerita Pulè, it responds to our fractured, contemporary times through three film-based installations and a layering of fictions, myths, and histories. Following Aristotle's philosophy of "doubting well", the pavilion attempts to counter the certainty of political rhetoric and the extremes in which the world finds itself. "Doubting well" refers, not to a paralysis leading to inaction, but rather a call to action, and an acknowledgement that multiple voices and viewpoints can exist in the world side by side. Thus, the artists' works anchor themselves in the present by re-examining and reinventing our pasts. Aiming to encourage a shift away from loud, political convictions, the Pavilion advocates for a questioning of global systems. Adrian MM Abela's work feeds on extracts from our founding texts and constitutions, and plays with versions and variations of myths and logics through digital technologies, sculptural elements, and hand-drawn pieces. Charlie Cauchi's Dolce decodes Roman mythology alongside contemporary consumerist culture through a pastiche of two seminal cinematic works. And Raphael Vella draws from 20th century archival footage of protests and revolutions to create his experimental, large-scale stop-motion animation. No Need to Sparkle reflects on these themes through writings by contributors including sociologist Michael Briguglio, philosophers Federico Campagna and Vid Simoniti, writer Ryan Falzon, cultural theorist Valeria Graziano and political scientist Michelle Pace.