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British artist Pete Codling presents Vessel to Vassal, an exhibition of drawings, prints and sculpture exploring voyage, containment and personal change
British artist Pete Codling presents Vessel to Vassal, an exhibition of drawings, prints and sculpture exploring voyage, containment and personal change.
Developed through his continuing relationship with Malta and Gozo, the exhibition brings new work into dialogue with recurring bottle imagery, selected earlier pieces and the artist’s 2010 Ark series.
The exhibition follows Codling’s physical and emotional movement between Portsmouth, Malta and Gozo during several years of considerable personal and creative change.
“My bottles have never simply contained messages. They contain people, animals, angels, memories and emotions. They can preserve and protect, but they can also isolate and imprison. This exhibition reflects a period in which I have travelled repeatedly between Portsmouth and Gozo, carrying one place into another. Like any traveller, explorer or artist, I sometimes feel that I am steering my own course, while at other times I am carried by circumstance, by other people, by physical and emotional weather, and by the unpredictable currents of fate,” Codling said.
At its centre is the bottle as a vessel for people, animals, angels, objects and emotions. These transparent containers may offer protection and passage, but also suggest isolation, confinement and the psychological experience of being visible without being reached.
The title Vessel to Vassal describes this unstable relationship. The vessel carries its contents, while the person or creature inside becomes subject to its protection, direction and limits. At the same time, the vessel may become servant to its cargo, burdened and defined by what it must preserve.
The exhibition also considers the wider experience of travel and exploration. We may believe we are steering our own course, yet every journey is affected by weather, circumstance, personal relationships and fate. The traveller may begin with agency and adventure, but can gradually become subject to the sea, the vessel, the cargo and the destination itself.
Key new work
A substantial new charcoal drawing will respond to Sansuna, the legendary Gozitan giantess associated with carrying megaliths across the island. Rather than illustrating the folklore literally, the drawing will consider parenthood, strength, responsibility, inherited history and the act of carrying culture forward.
The exhibition will run from 4 September to 7 September 2026 at Arthall, 8, Triq Agius de Soldanis, Victoria, Gozo. The exhibition space is open from 10am to 1pm, with afternoons available by appointment. Opening night is on 4 September at 7.30pm. The exhibition is in partnership with Arthall Gozo and Bored Peach Club.
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Copyright © MediaToday Co. Ltd, Vjal ir-Rihan, San Gwann SGN 9016, Malta, Europe
Reproduction of material from this website without written permission is strictly prohibited.