Jeni on Drawing 13 Drawing After
Creativity is best learned by inspiration. By copying drawings we admire, working in the style of someone else, we learn how it feels to move our hands and make...
Malta Diary Ggantija Neolithic Temples – built by a giantess who devoured broad beans and honey?
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: I have heard some strange stories in my life – but this has to be one of the strangest!...
MALTA DIARY: In the darkness of night, the mists of time – mysterious old wives’ tales that people swallowed
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: Some well-known fairy tales dated pre-history and were subsequently and diligently handed down from one generation to another...
Malta Diary A pictorial panorama of the Maltese Islands over the last 200 years
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My four grandparents died 50, 40 and 30 years ago. I often muse that if they were resurrected today...
Malta Diary Searching for the soul – “the ultimate layer underneath the skin” Ray Piscopo’s paintings of haunting qualities
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: Professor Oliver Friggieri, a Maltese poet, novelist, literary critic and philosopher who relentlessly promoted the Maltese Language, sadly passed away recently on...
Malta Diary The island of Comino – small but with a history during various eras Last week it had a population of three but sadly now down to two
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: The Maltese Archipelago, probably one of the smallest in the world, consists of five islands, Malta, Gozo, Comino, Filfla and St Paul’s...
Malta Diary Good urban planning – or a subterfuge for spirits, humanoids and secret sects? Maybe it was just plain commonsense?
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: The island of Malta is riddled with underground tunnels and the two islands of Malta and Gozo abound with caves,...
Malta Diary A history of plagues and epidemics over many decades – restrictions are endemic in the DNA of the people of the Maltese Islands
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: Yep, Christmas is coming and we should be hearing the tinkling of bells and the rustling of holly and ivy –...
Malta Diary Which country has the largest concentration of windmills in the world?
“Granite jaws that look down on fields of grain and devour them!” ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: In his poem ‘The Windmill’, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote: “Behold! a giant am I!...
Jeni on Drawing 4 – Drawing Around
When you think about it, drawing lines around things is really trying to capture an illusion. There are no lines around anything we see, only edges where one ‘thing’...
Malta Diary Venice in Malta? A Grand Canal Scheme that went awry – and left its unpleasant aftermath
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: How shattering when a grand scheme based on noble aims goes askew and leaves a bitter aftermath that continued to...
Jeni on Drawing 3 Drawing on Past Experience
More years ago than I care to count, when I was doing an art foundation course at Hull Art College, I fell in love with life drawing....
Malta Diary Touches of sanity in today’s eyesore concrete jungle -archaeological sites and buildings now Scheduled and cannot be destroyed or altered in any way
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: I have written it before and repeat, if my great grandparents and grandparents were to be resurrected today and placed anywhere in...
Malta Diary Memories of boyhood fishing days – another pleasure lost to today’s young generation?
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: The sea is never far away in Malta and Gozo and is very much part of the DNA of its...
Malta Diary Notorious characters – fascinating stories – some little-known aspects of shady Maltese characters
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: Every country has its share of notorious characters, Malta no less. I will relate the stories of some of...
MALTA DIARY: TripAdvisor awards high certificate to four Malta military sites – added to a number of previous recognition awards
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: Last year a number of major sites in Malta and Gozo all received a Certificate of Excellence from TripAdvisor...
MALTA DIARY: You can take the Maltese out of fireworks – but you can’t take fireworks out of the Maltese!
Gloom and low morale offset by colour and spectacle ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: August was planned as a bonanza month when in...
Malta Diary. Evidence of Phoenician animal sacrifices found at Tas-Silġ They date back to 1,500 BC
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: As happens time and time again, excavation works on a site had to be stopped after the discovery of...
Malta Diary A pictorial panorama of the Maltese Islands over the last 200 years
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My four grandparents died 50, 40 and 30 years ago. I often muse that if they were resurrected today and...
Malta Diary Malta and Gozo – a sea of treasures … the Coral Islands
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: From an early age I was a habitual bookworm, reading everything that was readable. Road signs, displayed adverts, street...
Malta Diary What is happening under the seawater surface – now possible to be virtually present to make my dreams come true
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: The sea has always been my magnet from very, very early days. We lived ten minutes walking distance...
Malta Diary The feast of Illuminations ‘L-Imnarja’ – but this time in a lesser light …
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: The 29th of June, date of the feast commemorating Saints Peter and Paul, has been a major event in...
Malta Diary Mob Rule trickles into Malta too – once more idiots come to the fore
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: I normally refrain from presenting political situations on this site which is after all dedicated to Travel and Leisure. However,...
Malta Diary Blue seas, blue skies – but will we enjoy them with tranquillity once more? Here comes summer!
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: I was then a youngster and the world was my oyster. Cares and worries were little except what was next...
Malta Diary Once upon a time, olive oil was more precious than gold …Roman armies relied on it
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: They used to say that armies marched on their stomachs. However, Roman armies marched on olive oil. Without it...
MALTA DIARY: Elaborate and extensive catacombs in Malta and a Punic tomb recently discovered probably dating back to 500 BC
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: The Carthaginians ruled Malta before they were ousted by the Romans in about 250 BC...
Malta Diary Hubble bubble, toil and trouble – medicinal folklore in the Maltese Islands – were they genuine remedies or fantasies?
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: Cast your minds back to the days when a person could go through a whole life...
Malta Diary An enchanting timeline of history and beauty – the ten most beautiful places in the Maltese Islands – and why
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: We are now approaching the month of May. Under normal circumstances the Maltese Islands would be teeming with...
MALTA DIARY: Were the stones magically or divinely transported – or is it just Old Wives’ Tales?
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: With time hanging heavy on my hands, I browsed through some well-known fairy and folklore tales...
Malta Diary Longing to return to as we were – or are we better off as we are – but MINUS corona scourge?
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: Let me take you back a year ago to a Friday, not a particular Friday but...
Malta Diary In the mists of time did the Maltese Islands have an importance far exceeding their miniscule size?
It is an indisputable fact that in terms of size, being one of the world’s smallest countries, on a per square metre (or mile) comparison, the volume of historical...
Malta Diary. Is this The Apocalypse or have we been through it all before?
Typhoid, Yellow Fever, Cholera, Black Plague – the Maltese Islands have suffered all these before … and survived This is a bad, sad, sorrowful and morose time...
Malta Diary As we were – lost and gone forever – memories of Malta in my childhood
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: Take a good look at the above picture – a picture that tells not...
Malta Diary “We may not die of the coronavirus but may well die of all the anxiety caused by reports about it”
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: It has been a week of wholesale panic, mixing together a weekend of Carnival, Ash...
Malta Diary Entering the Lenten period – a time for sackcloth and ashes? It used to be – but no longer … memories of the past
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: Today is Ash Wednesday. Carnival activities of boisterous merriment came to an abrupt end at midnight...
Malta Diary Maltese blood in the US Washington White House? Could well be! Maltese diaspora rootin’ ‘n tootin’ for Pete Buttigieg
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: Most of the world has now heard of Pete Buttigieg, the Democrat striving to win...
Malta Diary Carnival – time to let your hair down or is it just an excuse for wanton revelry? To be correct or incorrect – that is the question nowadays
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: In a couple of weeks’ time Malta and Gozo will be celebrating their Carnival weekend –...
Malta Diary The British Royal Navy and its impact on the Maltese Language HMS DEE and HMS DON still part of today’s Maltese tongue after almost 145 years
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: The French Mediterranean Fleet on its way to the Battle of the Nile toward the...
Malta Diary Malta and Gozo – islands packed with ancient treasures
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: Malta and Gozo comprise one of the smallest island groups in the world. However,...
Malta Diary If the sun shines too much outside, block it out – but deploy floor and wall tiles to bring the colour in!
ALBERT FENECH e/mail – Facebook: My Blog: Artistic craftsmanship has been slowly but surely dwindling and disappearing throughout the Maltese Islands, previously...