Giuseppe Calì

Giuseppe Calì (14 August 1846 – 1 March 1930) was a Maltese painter of Italian descent.

Biography

Born in Valletta, Calì was baptised at the Dominican Parish Church of Porto Salvo, one of the seven offsprings of the artist and musician Raffaele Calì, set designer at the Royal Theatre, and of mezzo-soprano Giovanna Padiglione. His parents, who were from Naples, had moved to British Malta in 1840.

At age 19, in 1865, thanks to the generosity of the merchant William Stephen Eynaud, The influences of both Mancinelli and Morelli are visible in the Death of Dragut and in other works of his early period.

Calì's art soon found wide acceptance in Malta, where he got employed in decorating private houses with landscapes and portraits. Only after 1870 Calì started to accept Church commissions. He also had a great influence on Maltese society, he painted about fifty portraits of famous people in Malta. This should include the portraits of Cardinal Lavigerie (1884), Cardinal Logue (1886), as well as Governor Richard More O'Ferrall, Marquis Emanuele Scicluna, Giovanni Battista Schembri, Achille Camilleri, Edward V. Ferro, Sir Victor Houlton, Judge Sir Adrian Dingli, Rector of university Napoleone Tagliaferro, Pope Pius IX, Judge Paolo Debono, Count and Countess of Messina, and Lord and Lady Strickland.

List of works

The proscenium arch of the Teatru Salesjan in Sliema, Malta was decorated in 1910 with the reminiscent oil on stone painting entitled The Virtues of Mankind. The painting is surrounded by rich bas-relief, pre-art deco stucco decorations full of symbolism.

Death of Dragut (oil on canvas, 1867), widely considered his best work, now in the National Museum of Fine Arts, Valletta St Jerome and St Lawrence altarpieces (oil on canvas, 1881), Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Parish Church (Sacro Cuore), Sliema Virgin of the Rosary (his first work), and Prophets, and episodes from the life of Christ in the parish church of Mosta. St. Dominic altarpiece, Basilica of St Dominic, Valletta (Porto Salvo) portraits of the merchant Agostino Cassar Torregiani and of Judge Carbone Tre Rome (1911) Nativity of Jesus Christ, St Andrew's Parish Church, Luqa Saint Dominic, St Andrew's Parish Church, Luqa Saint Michael, St Andrew's Parish Church, Luqa Sacred Heart of Jesus (destroyed during World War II), St Andrew's Parish Church, Luqa Our Lady of the Rosary, St Andrew's Parish Church, Luqa Saint Paul and Saint Catherine V.M., St Andrew's Parish Church, Luqa Apotheosis of St. Francis, St Francis of Assisi Church, Valletta The Sacred Heart of Jesus, Fontana parish church, Fontana, Gozo The Assumption of Mary, Parish Church of the Assumption, Qrendi St. Lawrence Martyr, San Lawrenz parish, Gozo Main apse, minor chapel apse and St. Joseph, St Helen's Basilica, Birkirkara The Four Seasons - four putti in the entrance hall of Villa Alhambra, Sliema Woman carried by the sea, National Museum of Fine Arts, Valletta Untitled painting symbolising a martyrdom Casa Rocca Piccola