About
Folded Currents

In Folded Currents, artists Karen Calleja and Joseph Casapinta bring together two distinct yet deeply resonant visual languages. Their works converse through rhythm and movement: Calleja’s sculptural canvases breathe with tactile folds of emotion, while Casapinta’s fluid washes of pigment echo the perpetual ebb and flow of life. Both artists, through their respective mediums, explore the metaphorical currents that shape human experience: the turns, tensions, and quiet resolutions that define our existence

 

Calleja’s three-dimensional compositions transcend the traditional flatness of the painted surface. Using a combination of materials and techniques, she manipulates texture and form to create rhythmic undulations that recall the folds of fabric or the layered strata of memory. Her approach evokes a tactile sense of motion, an interplay between control and surrender. The darkened bronze and black tones in works such as Contours of Stillness are at once sombre and luminous, suggesting the duality of struggle and transcendence. Each fold embodies a gesture of release, a moment of meditation transformed into sculptural poetry. Other works, like From Above and Knots of Life, express abstract and spontaneous processes of making, using materiality to create form, line, and flow. Casapinta’s paintings, on the other hand, are imbued with the mercurial life of water. His deft handling of watercolour and charcoal captures fleeting atmospheres, evoking both the turbulence and calm of sea and psyche. In works such as Kontra lKurrent, an evocative seascape, a sailing boat navigates through restless waters beneath a charged sky. The imagery speaks of endurance; the courage to move forward despite the storm. Casapinta’s mastery lies in his ability to balance spontaneity with precision, crafting spaces where realism dissolves into emotion. His waters become metaphors for time, resilience, and the quiet persistence of the human spirit. Other works, including Il-Kbir Għadu Ġej, Bejn Sema u Ilma, and Imrassin, demonstrate the artist’s ability to capture any subject, be it sea, land, or object, through a narrative that emerges even in the absence of a multicoloured palette. In this collection of watercolour paintings, Casapinta adopts a more limited palette, at times approaching monochrome, marking a notable departure from his earlier, more colourful works. This shift represents a deeply personal and challenging phase of experimentation and expression, reflecting an evolution in both vision and emotion. Both artists share a profound understanding of process as transformation. Calleja’s tactile

 

layering mirrors the internal work of reflection and healing, while Casapinta’s liquid washes reveal the serenity that follows turbulence. Their practices, though outwardly different, converge on a shared philosophical current, art as movement, as therapy, and as a dialogue with life’s unpredictability. The title of the exhibition, Folded Currents, encapsulates this shared ethos. It speaks of surrendering to the changeable flow of life while embracing the form it takes. Calleja’s folds are tangible manifestations of energy turned inward; Casapinta’s currents, outward expressions of that same energy set in motion. Together, their works form a harmonious conversation between solidity and fluidity, structure and dissolution. Both artists are also the founders of Indigo Arts Gallery & Studio in Żebbuġ, a creative hub that fosters experimentation, education, and artistic community. This collaboration at Gemelli Art Gallery extends that spirit of partnership, an exhibition that invites viewers to reflect on their own inner folds and currents, and to find beauty in the tension between movement and stillness. Ultimately, Folded Currents foregrounds the themes of resilience and transformation, framing life as an evolving continuum of adaptation and renewal. The exhibition will open on 7 November at 7pm and will run until 22 November at the Gemelli Art Gallery, Ta’ Qali Crafts Village.

 

Prof. Louis Laganà, PhD (Lough.) is an academic, curator, and practising artist