Commoditising Rubble in Maltese Suburbia: A Photo-Essay

Journal of Mediterranean Studies, 2003 ISSN: 1016-3476 Vol. 13, No. 1: 157-167 C O M M O D I T I S I N G R U B B L E I N M A L T E S E S U B U R B I A : A P H O T O - E S S A Y Da v id E. Za m m it U niversity o f M alta These photos reflect an attempt to read house facades as texts, to decode the cultural meanings disclosed and disguised by the practical materiality of stone. They also aim to highlight a specific moment in Maltese history, when rubble itself came to be commoditised, appropriated and invested with new meanings. Frozen in time and objectified by the camera lens, it becomes possible to perceive rubble as ‘matter out of place’ (Douglas, M: 1984) and to question the latent symbolism in terms of which taste is formed and expressed in practice. The focus is on a specific application of rubble known in Maltese as sejjiegh dekorattiv, or decorative rubble. Until recently, rubble was considered primarily as a waste product, or at best as material for the thrifty farmer to use in building the hita n ta s-sejjieg h , the dry-stone retaining walls which still surround fields in the agricultural areas left intact from encroachment by Malta’s urban sprawl. Sometime during the late 1980’s, the weathered stones from dismantled or collapsed dry-stone walls were gathered and their outer surfaces sawn away in laminae about an inch thick. These laminae, weathered and rugged on one side, freshly cut and smooth on the other, were then glued side by side to the facades of newly built houses. The neatly cut white limestone ashlar masonry in which these facades had been built was concealed beneath the collage of darkened and irregularly shaped slices of rubble. At first glance, the areas treated in this way, evoked a rubble wall. Since then this rubble screening treatment has spread, becoming one of the dominant m otifs of the Maltese suburban streetscape. As the photos reveal, different varieties of weathered stone have evolved, accompanying new ways of integrating them into facades. Often it is a component of Copyright © 2003 Mediterranean Institute, University of Malta. 158 D a v id E. Z am m it eclectic mixtures of architectural styles and building materials, where ‘decorative rubble’, aluminium windows, marble slabs and balustrades jostle kaleidoscopically to attract attention. The resulting emphasis on eye-catching surfaces irresistibly evokes other post-modern buildings. Yet the process remains ambiguous and polysemic and cannot be reduced to a manifest­ ation of a global trend. Statues of the Madonna of Lourdes, encased in a miniature grotto, can be grafted on to the fake rubble wall (Plate 4), reminding us of the sacred rural sites created by the Christian tradition. House names in archaic Maltese together with old farming implements are used in conjunction with the rubble to evoke a primordial rural Malta. These stylistic practices owe as much to the influence of vernacular baroque as they do to post-modern architecture. Who is meant to view these facades and which messages do they convey? If decorative rubble metonymically evokes a primordial countryside, this is an image that is usually contained within a modem frame of reference. Rarely allowed to dominate house facades, the rough rubble stone is often juxtaposed with overtly modem, smooth and polished surfaces. Sometimes it is used in order to frame modem architectural features, such as aluminium windows, or it is itself framed by a border of marble slabs that straightens out its irregular edges (Plates 3, 4 &7). The tension between modernity and antiquity is consciously reproduced. House facades are sanded down to expose the fresh smooth white stone, contrasting with the jagged, weathered, rubble screens (Plate 4). In other cases decorative rubble is utilised to create an idealised mral space, surrounding the front entrance and garden walls while leaving the house building untouched (Plates 1, 3, 4 & 6). The rustic past is evoked only as an encapsulated memory. The logic of encapsulation is also mirrored in broader patterns of diffusion of ‘decorative rabble’. Although...