Malta’s first-ever national contemporary art museum, the Malta International Contemporary Arts Space (MICAS), was inaugurated on Friday, October 25th, 2024, with a joyous and monumental exhibition from the acclaimed and visionary Portuguese artist, Joana Vasconcelos.
MICAS was officially opened by Malta’s Prime Minister Robert Abela, Joana Vasconcelos, and Malta’s Minister for National Heritage, Arts, and Local Government, Owen Bonnica, as well as the MICAS board, led by executive chairperson, Phyllis Muscat.
MICAS will be open to the public on Sunday, November 27th, 2024.
Special guests at the official inauguration cast their eyes on three major works of Joana Vasconcelos, the Tree Of Life, Garden of Eden, and Valkyrie Mumbet, as well as a series of other works, which literally took over the four-story space at MICAS.
Under the stewardship of the MICAS board, this previously inaccessible complex of historic buildings has now been reopened to the community as Malta’s newest cultural destination.
Prime Minister Robert Abela said the opening of MICAS was a transformative moment for the island-nation of Malta, and paid tribute to all the ideators and workers who had brought the concept to fruition.
MICAS executive chair Phyllis Muscat outlined the evolution of a concept, which was formally kick-started in 2018, to respond to decades-long calls by Maltese artists for a contemporary arts space, and paid tribute to the efforts of the MICAS board in reaching out to the world of international art.
The artist Joana Vasconcelos gave thanks to the MICAS board for inviting her to open Malta’s newest contemporary arts museum and paid tribute to the MICAS board.
Minister for National Heritage and the Arts Owen Bonnici toasted the historic moment, in which about 43,000 sq ft of previously inaccessible land was being returned to the community in the form of a cultural infrastructure project. He stated, “It is a strong investment in the people’s well-being, families, and our quality of life… art not only beautifies and feeds our souls, but it strengthens the nation. A future without culture would be a future without humanity.”
Immediately visible at the lowest level of the museum was the towering Tree Of Life, with its 110,000 hand-stitched and embroidered fabric leaves, fungi, mosses and lichens, stumps and branches, bringing to life the immense spaciousness of MICAS’s raw and restrained interior. A musical composition specifically created for Tree Of Life was sung by the baritone Rui de Luna Vasconcelos, who also sang other works in the Portuguese tradition.
