21 March 2007 Rating 141% No Comment  

A large group of teenage students from Taverna, the Italian town which was Mattia Preti's birthplace, visited St George's basilica last week. They were accompanied by members of the teaching staff of the art school which they attend, as well as by two guides from Malta, one of them a scholar specialising in the art of the famous Italian painter. The Istituto di Istruzione Superiore 'Umberto Sorace Maresca' of Catanzaro organized the trip to Malta because of the large number of paintings that Mattia Preti was commissioned to do here. The students had already visited the Co-Cathedral of St John's, Mattia Preti's living monument, and other venues that boast his paintings before they crossed over to Gozo to view his two sole canvasses on the island. These had been commissioned in the 1670s for St George's basilica and they are The Triumph of St George, the main altarpiece, and the large canvas of Our Lady of the Souls of Purgatory. The visiting group was greeted by the archpriest, Mgr Joseph Farrugia. The archpriest presented all the young visitors with a souvenir of the basilica and presented an issue of the magazine San ?or?, which contained a special article on the main altarpiece, to be kept in the library of their school. Cultural visits to St George's basilica are a frequent occurrence and most of the time they take place without the knowledge of the basilica's administration. When the Parish Office is advised of these visits, collaboration is offered to the visitors to make sure that they are made to feel welcome. St George's basilica is a treasure trove of art and a visit to it is a must for visitors to Gozo. Tourists who miss it would have missed the most important Baroque and neo-classical edifice of the island that not only holds the most noteworthy works of art on the island but is itself a most significant and beautiful place of Christian worship.