Margerita Pulè
Artist and Cultural Worker
The Irish Maltese Artist uses walking art, photography, documentation, drawing and non-object-based art to protest a current context of pitting steroidal economic over-development against social and urban well-being. Malta is exposed to an increasing gentrification pressure on its tiny territory.

“My practice has come to fall somewhere between conflict-tourism and a visual search for stability in an increasingly unstable urban environment. Creating work has become an act of indirect resistance, and an attempt to protect our (urban) environment from its over-commodification and economic exploitation.”

For the Mahalla Festival the artist will install a Cement Bakery at the Palazzo in Zabbar:

Flour and bread-making have historically been symbolic of nurturing, a signifier of strong communities and imbued with many layers of cultural significance. The value given to flour across cultures and over centuries is indicative of its importance. However now another finely-ground substance can also be said to be the life-blood of our society. Cement has become ubiquitous to contemporary urban life, particularly in Malta.

Do you know what’s in your bread? Pure flour, a little bit of salt to taste, and some yeast to help it rise? What else? Cement?Many societies around the world bake breads that are unique to their geography and culture. From milk-laden soda bread, to unleavened flat bread, and from buttery croissants to seed-heavy black breads, each slice reflects its origins, and represents home to those who grow up eating it.

But what does bread look like when it contains ingredients from today’s environment? How do cement and flour mix and bake, and, more importantly how does cement-bread taste?