Description
This book contains a second set of photographs of Malta, from the work of Guido Stilon, taken over the period from the mid-fifties to the mid-seventies – a period of massive change in Malta – from the thousands in the collection bequeathed by Guido’s widow, Grace, to the National Archives of Malta. It is inevitably a documentary record of a “bygone era”, as the title of this book points out. It is a fascinating opportunity to see Malta as it was and see it through the eyes of somebody who felt the need and the passion to document the moment.
The fifties and sixties saw a massive revolution in the technology and practice of photography. Cameras were not automatic. Film was mostly black and white, with low ASA speeds – only in the late sixties did Kodak put on the market a film with ASA speed of 800, with a grainy quality.
Stilon does not just document things “as they are”; he highlights hidden things to make them visible; when there is the opportunity, he changes reality to add something new, as an artist does. Tony Ray-Jones, who travelled throughout England photographing what he saw as a disappearing way of life, put it, “photography can be a mirror and reflect life as it is, but I also think that it is possible to walk, like Alice, through the looking glass and find another world with the camera”.
After the success of the first volume published last year, which is virtually sold out, this sequel is a must for book lovers and collectors.
FOREWORD BY PROFESSOR ALEX TORPIANO
