The failed dream

On Culture Mapping Valletta 2018 Edited by Vicki Ann Cremona Publisher: Midsea Books 2016 Extent: 102pp

We are now well past the middle of 2018, the year when Valletta is one of the two European Capitals of Culture.

We can thus look back at what has taken place in the past months and look even further back at the hopes and ambitions when Valletta was nominated. A certain amount of assessment can now be made.

This slim book is a collection of essays, presenting a multidisciplinary perspective on the use of space, whether public, private and communal, for cultural activity and expression.

Such a study is of primary importance, the book says, to any city that aspires to engage its citizens in processes of civic and artistic creativity. So Valletta’s ECoC 2018 title encourages a critical reflection on the use of space, examines the various cultural practices undertaken by the local communities and raising questions how these activities are mediated and negotiated through the city’s space and cultural infrastructure.

That, anyway, was the intention behind this book. Through exploring the use of cultural spaces for different types of cultural interaction – from Argentine tango to the use of theatre spaces – the different articles by people coming from different academic areas analyse Malta’s ever-changing cultural sector both in terms of cultural infrastructure and cultural policy in the run-up to Valletta 2018.

Thus Jean-Paul Baldacchino, a dancer and an anthropologist, analyses the many schools of Argentine tango and ballroom dancing that exist in Malta, despite that successive surveys show that the Maltese are not culturally involved as their counterparts in Europe.

Ruben Paul Borg draws a quality assessment of culture space with special reference to the theatres in Valletta, from St James Cavalier to MITP with just a gloss on the real state of these theatres and how they are being used (or not used).

William Zammit likewise analyses the libraries in Valletta from the National Library to the Notarial Archives touching on the libraries of religious institutions and of families and individuals. He points out that the National Library remains (or remained) inaccessible to many, points out that the Public Registry archive is practically unknown and concludes that Valletta’s rich written memory institutions provide some serious challenges but also exciting opportunities.

Three articles approach the issue from a theoretical point of view. Marie Briguglio assesses the response and involvement of Maltese citizens in the build-up to Valletta 18 and the relationship of such involvement with well-

being; Colin Borg looks at the way the National Cultural Policy is being perceived at the level of local councils and questions whether the shift from government to governance is really taking place and Peter Mayo and Carmel Borg discuss museums from a critical cultural studies and leftist point of view with special reference to the Muza project.

JosAnn Cutajar and John Vella move out from Valletta and study Cottonera with special reference to two different approaches – Integrated Resource Management or the politics of demand with the use of EU funds and Centru Tbexbix with its approach from ground level upwards. With some premonition they warn that topdown, investment-led approaches are packing waterfronts with luxury accommodation, offices, leisure activities and catering outlets aimed at attracting tourists and the upper middle-class and in the process destroying the distinctive spirit of place.

But what is absolutely prophetic is the introduction by Vicki Ann Cremona who describes the principles written in the bid book which led to Valletta being declared ECoC for 2018 in October 2012, thus in a different era for Malta and Valletta. The bid book underlined two themes for Valletta 18 – exchange and imagination.

Since its foundation in 1566, Valletta has served as the country’s governmental, financial and cultural capital. The city can certainly be defined as a place of exchange. The city’s intense harbour activity has constantly brought about exchange between the local inhabitants and people from other areas of Malta as well as with those coming from other lands and cultures.

The pre-selection bid book for Valletta 2018 promoted the idea of cultural regeneration through an “environment of exchange”. Now ask yourselves whether this has been achieved when the person at the top engaged in partisan diatribes and when the local council declared it felt left out of V18 activities.

The final selection bid book was entitled Imagine 18 and promoted the idea that each citizen could have a say in shaping the vision of Valletta as capital of culture and included a series of projects that were proposed by various persons and entities.

Not only was this not carried out but almost two-thirds of the year have passed and we are still waiting for Muza to open, for the abattoir restructuring to be done and for the Valletta ditch to be embellished.

V18 has created some mass entertainment events, it is true, but it has not led to the cultural regeneration it was meant to. One would be hard put to deny there

The city’s intense harbour activity has constantly brought about exchange between the local inhabitants and people from other areas of Malta as well as with those coming from other lands and cultures

has been a huge leap of quality in Valletta’s cultural environment (unless that is the production of

Stitching and the jury is still out to conclude that “access to culture, increase of practice and level of improvement” have been dramatically improved by V18.