Antony Micallef

Antony Micallef isn’t constrained by the boundaries of sculpture and painting. Instead, he uses thick impasto –  the process of layering on paint so it stands out from a surface – to create his 3D pieces. He also pushes this process to the extremes – scraping, twisting and ‘excavating’ the paint. Further texture is added by recycling dried paint from his palette and studio walls. The resulting pieces are distorted, charged and raw. This application is in sharp contract with the flat backgrounds of many of his paintings. Each one uses glazing techniques synonymous with the Renaissance artists like Rembrandt, and can often take weeks to perfect.

Through his work, Micallef dissects contemporary ideas of the self in the most personal way – by brutalising the self-portrait. In an age of social media, his attack on representation of the self-portrait feels particularly relevant. “I’ve stripped away the veneer and showed what lies beneath.” The combination of grotesque texture – alongside a palette of pinks and reds – makes each work somewhat disturbing. Often reminiscent of raw flesh. These portraits are stripped down to the bone. Through this distortion, Micallef presents works that are raw and full of emotion – a far cry from what he sees as the superficiality of appearances online.