ANTONY MICALLEF INTERVIEW WITH MC LLAMAS, SPRING 2014

INTERVIEWER: Do you believe in God?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I used to.

INTERVIEWER: You used to?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I’ve been brought up Catholic so I have a huge, I feel guilty if I say no which I guess is what they intended. 

INTERVIEWER: So?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I am spiritual.

INTERVIEWER: Yeah.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: So, yeah I’m spiritual.

INTERVIEWER: What made you change your opinion?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Education, self education, politics, greed. God I hope my parents don’t read this. But I’m spiritual. I believe in goodness if that makes sense.

INTERVIEWER: In goodness?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well, I believe in energy – call that what you want I guess. But I’m spiritual. I don’t believe in one religion though.

INTERVIEWER: Okay, have you found that working on this particular piece of work has aroused any emotions that you didn’t feel while working on other pieces?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: No. For me it was purely satirical.  I wouldn’t say deep knowledge. Well like I said, I’ve been brought up Catholic so I used to see the formal Stations of the Cross every Sunday. I was surprised at the one I chose actually because well, I thought, you know, it’s like when I used to watch Jesus of Nazareth, I just always wanted to watch the crucifixion scenes. It’s like the best bit, isn’t it?

INTERVIEWER: Yeah.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: All the gore and seeing Romans and stuff. But I thought the idea I had for it was quite appropriate so I chose the Third Station.

INTERVIEWER: And why do you think the gore attracts so much with the imagery of the Christ? Because when you do it, it tends to be quite romantic in the typical sense of the term, so why the gore?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Why the gore? I think it’s just, I’m trying to tick out the right words but, I don’t want to say it’s exciting because you’re watching someone being tortured, aren’t you. But—.

INTERVIEWER: How is it exciting, emotionally or?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Fuck.

INTERVIEWER: Physically or?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah, that’s it. No, I’m going to get quoted. No, I think—.

INTERVIEWER: This is a missed chance.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well I guess someone’s prepared to go through that, the idea is that someone’s prepared to go through that in honor of us, to save our sins, that’s quite a big deal isn’t it, really. I guess all the other episodes of Jesus of Nazareth, it’s just, I mean, you know, well, I think the intention was good.

INTERVIEWER: Which intention?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well, the intention. You know, what he said as a man, if he existed. Oh, I feel so guilty saying that.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think he existed as a physical man?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah, yeah, I think he probably did, but I think—. The reason why I get—. I have a problem with religion because I think the Catholic Church just became about wealth and greed and power and all these other things which is completely separate, I think, from what he was teaching. So yeah. Why do I find the Crucifixion so interesting?

INTERVIEWER: What do you find attractive about the Crucifixion?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well, I just think, you’re hanging a man on a cross; you’re nailing him into a cross. That’s—. Fucking hell. It’s crazy. I used to walk past churches, there’s this massive church in Brighton where I used to go and pick up wood to make canvasses and there’s a massive Crucifixion on the outside. And I thought God, if you came down on this planet and you just saw that, you’d think my God, what do these people do. You know what I mean? It’s just crazy. Yeah.

INTERVIEWER: Why have you chosen to work on this particular project?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well I think in order to do anything relating to a Crucifixion, I think you have to do it well. It’s a really tough subject so I found it a real challenge and that’s why I wanted to do it. Yeah, I’ve always wanted to do something related to this but never really felt I had enough of a reason to sort of validate it myself. So to be asked to do something like this particular project for me is really intriguing.

INTERVIEWER: What do you mean by validated?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I haven’t felt—. I’ve thought about maybe making crucifixes before but I think when you approach that subject you have to make it completely what you are doing and how to treat it. I haven’t been ready for it yet to do something related to that, but I guess that’s to do with my upbringing and my past. You’ve got to treat it with a certain amount of respect, just for the nature of what it is. I’m not saying because it’s Jesus Christ or you know. I just think it’s a subject you’ve got to handle really well and do it properly. I mean, I think the piece I’ve made, like I said, is quite satirical. I’ve kind of wanted to bring a contemporary feel to it I guess.

INTERVIEWER: Where do you think the satire lies in the original story of the Christ?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I don’t see there is any. For me it’s just hard, grounding stuff. I think if you’re brought up Catholic, it’s all ‘if you don’t do this you’ll go to hell’. I think you have to laugh at that because you’re only going to fucking cry, right. So I think being brought up Catholic and it’s drummed into your whole life, ‘I’ve got to be this person, I’ve got to do that, I’ve got to do this’ and if not you’ve got to repent, you’ve got to go to confession. I did go to confession a lot when I was younger. So I never saw a sort of funny side to it really. I don’t think there is a lot of humor at church, especially not with the music. But you grow up and you see things for what they are so it was nice to be able to have an opportunity to comment on it and how I see society these days and how I could relate it to that certain Station of the Cross.

INTERVIEWER: What sort of theme would your, like what did you confess about? What sort of theme would it revolve around?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: What, my confessions? I’m not going to tell you that! Well no, I mean I was young, I don’t mind. You know, you’re like ten years old, you’re like eleven, you’re twelve years old.

INTERVIEWER: What did you feel bad about then that needed something?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well, I mean you know, I think when you’re that young, I’m just a kid so you don’t really have a lot to confess anyway, but you can’t go in there and go ‘actually I’m clean’. There’s a big silence and then, you know, you’ve got to—. It’s quite contradictory because you go in there in order to tell your confessions and you think ‘well I haven’t done anything’ but you can’t be completely silent so you make stuff up. So you’re lying to the priest about things you haven’t done just to talk about a confession which, you know, I should be confessing that at the same time. I think you have this, I think that guilt is laid upon you from a very early age. It’s not the greatest way to bring up people. You’re born with original sin, I mean you’re a baby, I mean that’s, what’ve you done? I think that’s a strange way of bringing up human beings, isn’t it?

INTERVIEWER: You know, it’s the same for us with knowledge because you have this knowledge of being sinful but you don’t know what to do about it or how to transfer it to a truthful context.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah. I just, I wouldn’t want to bring my child up like that. So in order to bring up a whole civilization of people in that way just seems ridiculous.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think that the act of making art and painting releases supposed sins?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I don’t, well it can be therapeutic and it can help you out. I wouldn’t say it releases your sins. I mean if I’ve murdered someone then I just go paint a picture. I mean I should really go to jail now but I just painted this. I don’t think that really wipes my sin away. Might help you feel better but I think the power stops there.

INTERVIEWER: How do you feel about exhibiting in the church?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I really like it. I mean, I’m happy with my piece so I’ve done my bit. And I like the idea of exhibiting in the church, I feel like it should be exhibited in the church. I’ve only seen a couple of the other pieces or maybe one other piece so I’m intrigued to hear and listen to the views of the audience or the people. Is the church still running or is it just a space?

INTERVIEWER: It’s still running.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Okay, so I’m intrigued to hear how they’re going to respond to these pieces and I’m also intrigued to hear what the public is going to say about these pieces because I think it’s going to be quite— well the artists who are on board, I’m sure they are approaching it in quite a controversial way so I’m intrigued to hear what the public’s opinion is going to be.

INTERVIEWER: And how do you feel about having your work prayed at by people?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Prayed?

INTERVIEWER: Yeah.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Wow.

INTERVIEWER: Yeah, people going to pray at your work. How do you feel about that?

INTERVIEWER: Yeah.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: In awe. Yeah. That’s what I assumed you were going to say actually. Okay. Well I think art, as itself, can be quite metaphysical and so people get a lot from art anyway. Do people pray to art? But I think people get a lot from art. I mean I find the idea of someone standing in front of my piece and praying in front of it, I find that quite strange and weird. I mean I’m not commanding anything with my piece; I’m just making a point. That’s how I see it. I don’t think it should be prayed on. So if anyone does that, I’d be very surprised.

 Well if anyone prayed in front of any of my pieces, I mean I’d be flattered but I wouldn’t say it’s right or—. I mean if they’re happy, they’re happy, I mean. Yeah. So basically my piece, I mean we should go and see it I guess. So instead of Pontius Pilate I’ve got like The X Factor panel. You have Jesus Christ. I mean that’s my idea. And I just thought well basically the idea behind that is that, I mean I think that particular TV program signifies this—. Yeah, this culture and I’ve called the piece ‘Kill Your Rival’. And yeah, it’s about that building up and then you just sacrifice. And I think that our popular culture these days, it’s a bit like the Christians throwing the lions but we just want to completely humiliate them in public. And I guess that’s what we were doing when the Romans were here and stuff. But they were killing them. I’m sure if we could do that, we would. Eventually I think we’ll do that again on TV maybe in the future.

INTERVIEWER  Hunger Games?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah, yeah, it would be like that. I mean I haven’t seen it but or read the book but yeah, this is my way of just saying it’s kind of about that really. I mean the whole idea about like Big Brother and these programs, we put six people in a room and then we vote basically. We don’t want them to have a good time or to make conversation, we want to see them completely humiliate themselves in front of as many people as possible and I just think there’s something incredibly sad about that, us and that culture wanting that to happen.

INTERVIEWER: It’s a form of hierarchy, isn’t it, sacrificing the father figure in order to grow from it and that depends on what you said at the first.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah, yeah. It’s not nice, is it?

INTERVIEWER: We worship humans as if they were gods.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah, I mean everyone wants to be elevated to a celebrity with social media. Facebook is all about narcissism and voyeurism and everyone wants to be the rage with celebrity within a context.

INTERVIEWER: Everyone’s their own PR Company.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah I guess so and I’m just about being, do you know what I mean? Just not being on social media or—. I don’t know, I find it quite crazy sometimes even though I’m on it too.

INTERVIEWER: Just to talk about your piece, I think it’s symbolic that you mention The X Factor because obviously X is a cross, whatever, but I also think that when you see your piece, you can’t really make out who those people are but you can see the kind of character that you’re depicting which is this kind of smarmy media—.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well one of the, I mean the black guy from the American show, I mean he’s kind of painted in a more realistic way than say the other three are..... I mean, you’ve got the panel there and I think that the panel is quite symbolic these days. I mean there are so many shows where you have an artist or there’s a dancer and you have someone just saying ‘yes’ or ‘no’. I mean it’s the same way music gets into the fucking charts these days, I mean it’s manufactured until it’s completely synthetically made and you’ve got this panel saying yes or no. I don’t think that’s a great aspiration for children to grow up and think, you know this is what I’ve got to do, I’ve got to conform to this. If you’ve just got four people commanding your individuality, I mean I just think that’s all a bit fucked up.

INTERVIEWER  And it the concept of the panel also reminds me of the Judgment and like—.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah, yeah, of course.

INTERVIEWER  Is this going to go to heaven or—.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah, I mean because that’s the concept anyway isn’t it, when you go to heaven, you’ve got a judge up there or God up top of his cloud. It’s like X Factor times a thousand or something. Do you know what I mean? It’s like the glorification. Which is basically what the X Factor crew are doing anyway but you’ve got someone on this cloud supposedly going ‘have you been good? are you good enough to get into heaven?’ And the X Factor crew is like ‘are you good enough to get to the next round’, do you know what I mean? Which we’re all trying to do anyway when we elevate to heaven.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think there’s a set of rules or a constitution that organizes the way sacrifices are ordered within the contemporary world? So just like there was a sense of rules and behavior in Roman times when Christ was sacrificed, do you think there’s a set of rules to correspond to the contemporary world or is it more chaotic?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I guess that depends on the culture and the context of that culture. I mean it varies from country to country, right. So if you’re in a Muslim country or Syria or other places, it’s very different from here. But I think we all have our own sort of set of rules of what’s right and wrong and how we treat people. In LA, for example, again like I said, it’s all to do with celebrities isn’t it. So there’s a certain rule and way of conforming over there which is very different from here. But yeah, that varies in cultures.

INTERVIEWER: And what do you think the sacrifice is for?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well I think it’s to make—. What’s it for? Well sacrifice is kind of entertaining; it might make us feel better if we’re offering something up. I guess it depends on what kind of sacrifice. I mean if we’re talking about popular culture it’s just entertainment, but if you’re like Jesus Christ I’m sure it’s a bit more than that. But the Crucifixion was a punishment, wasn’t it, it wasn’t a sacrifice. The word sacrifice is to give something up in order to get something in return, isn’t it?

INTERVIEWER: How do you feel about your work being in the underground?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I think it’s great. I think the more people who see it, the better.

INTERVIEWER: Yeah.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well, I mean it’s great. I think art in the underground is fantastic, I mean so many people walk by every day, it’s fantastic.

INTERVIEWER: People praying at your work is just an accessory to having it in the underground.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah.

INTERVIEWER: People might pray to your work in the underground too actually.

ANTHONY MICALLEF:  But no, I mean, on a serious note, I think for an exhibition like this with this subject matter on the underground, I think it’s amazing. I’m intrigued. I mean, I haven’t seen all of the artwork but I imagine that some of them are quite controversial and I’m imagining that there will be, they might get some complaints or you know, if some of the pieces are quite controversial which I’m assuming they are. I’m just wondering how it’s all going to go. But I love it, I love the idea that you’re putting something down there and they try and find it. It’s a subject which is really going to connect or piss a lot of people off.

INTERVIEWER  I think it’s quite interesting that the artists are being so forthcoming in doing this show because normally if you If you say ‘come to church with me’, they’ll be like ‘no’.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah that’s why it’s such a unique thing to be a part of. It’s really rich subject matter and that’s why it’s so interesting to be a part of and that’s why I wanted to be a part of it. Yeah, it’s not often that these things come up so it’s really nice to be involved.

INTERVIEWER: We’re shifting the understanding of religious purpose to a more contemporary one when it hasn’t been done.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah, I mean I think the piece, I mean I can only obviously talk about my piece, but you know, I think celebrities are worshipped like idols. It’s like our contemporary religion in a sense isn’t it. I mean people know more about that than they do history and supposedly real religious leaders who existed.

INTERVIEWER: But there are great similarities.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah, yeah.

INTERVIEWER: I mean Jesus wasn’t basically like a celebrity.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Apart from the miracles.

INTERVIEWER I would disagree. I think people are performing miracles in modern day life as well. I can give you some examples.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well if someone’s made a miracle I hope they’ve done something unearthly that I could never do or no one could ever do. I mean it’s funny because all the people who were made saints are all dead. They’re like yeah he changed his toast into this fucking bottle of wine, you know what I mean. I think the definition of a miracle is doing something which is slightly magical, but it’s not isn’t it, within a spiritual context I guess, helping someone, otherwise you’re just Derren Brown or a magician I guess.

INTERVIEWER: Do you believe in magic?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: That’s a good question. Do I believe in magic? I like the idea of magic.

INTERVIEWER: In which context do you like the idea?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I just have a really good imagination. So in my head I can go ‘that’s magic’ and I just tell myself to believe it, believe and don’t ask any questions. Yeah, it’s probably not magic in technical terms but.

INTERVIEWER: What do you think is magic?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I think making something happen which shouldn’t happen or : It depends how you look at it. But maybe that’s what Jesus was doing. I think making something happen which shouldn’t happen or is not physically possible to happen. But also, no I think, I really like the romance of magic if that makes sense, like the idea of something happening in your day which is quirky and fun and enjoyable and beautiful.

INTERVIEWER: Basically you’re just describing having a wank.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well let’s just, I’m magic twice a day. Yeah there’s no miracle in there.

INTERVIEWER: That’s actually very interesting, you know why? Because like how we associate magic and everything that is mystical to actually the sexual pull of the self and that’s what Woolf was basically saying this morning. It’s very serious.

INTERVIEWER: And was what Ricardo [PH 00:29:50] Ginelli was saying yesterday is that the Christ is an idealized God or human figure that’s actually—.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: But that’s not magic is it.

INTERVIEWER: No, that’s just immaturity on my behalf. So the Christ is this idealized man that’s actually very sexual in various different ways especially when you see the depictions of the Christ at this time, of pornography, the equivalent of contemporary pornography and the way he was depicted in paintings and the various objects of his religion were actually quite voyeuristic and phallic in a lot of ways. So it’s, contemporary religion probably relates to the act of passion.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: But those images we know of Jesus Christ, they’re depicted by men and artists, well and women. It’s funny because when I think of Jesus Christ, I don’t think of anything kind of sexual or voyeuristic. I think of a man, a very simple man in sandals and a gown just walking around trying to help people out. And then that sort of ends there and then you have this whole system built around it to uplift this idea and make it into something ethereal and untouchable. It’s like the propaganda machine in all this and then you have the artists around that because the artists were depicting what the church wanted to say. I mean they did it with flair but I think it was more about them, how the artists depicted this thing, their suffering, but they can stick it in this one man, because that’s the only thing they could paint and show in those days. So they’re channeling all this stuff. But it is about being human. I agree in that sense. And if you talk about being human then you talk about desires and lust and all this, yeah.

INTERVIEWER: So do you think—because you were saying, the act of making art and being an artist is actually sacrificial—then maybe the process of making artwork is sacrificial in the sense of the Trial of the Christ and the pain and the emotions that go through— there’s literally narcissistic projection on a plane.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well I think the nature of being an artist is quite a narcissistic job anyway really because it’s all about you and how you feel, how you think and how you see the world, which is different from being a designer because you’re working for someone else, it’s about other people. But I think being a fine artist or an artist, you’re commenting on how you see the world, how you feel—. What was the question?

INTERVIEWER: How the act of making art can be sacrificial?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah, I don’t know if it’s sacrificial. I don’t think of it, I think you’re laying things on the line. I think, me, particularly, I make images so I can say things which have a certain amount of ambiguity, which I can’t say with texts or words because I’m giving too much away. But you know, you do … without trying to sound clichéd up… but you do throw in your pain and you’re trying to channel something into the scene, an emotion. Sacrificial, I don’t really see it as sacrificial. I just see it as a channel.

INTERVIEWER: Channeling, a channeling of what because for there to be channeling there has to be some sort of higher force that’s not controlled by the conscious mind?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well, channeled by what.

INTERVIEWER: Yeah, channeled by what. Or from what.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well, just for me, I don’t’ know. I don’t know the answer to that. All I know is that I work with a—what’s the word when things go through you, you’re a— Yeah, sometimes it feels like that, but I don’t know what the answer to, I don’t know. I mean I just don’t know if there’s anything else out there really. I mean I do, like I said I’m spiritual and I believe there is some kind of energy life and that’s connected to the earth and us being natural and part of this planet and organic—.

INTERVIEWER: So do you think that the Christ had a sense of control over what was happening to them, in the sense that you would have a sense of control whilst making an artwork.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Does Christ have a sense of control?

INTERVIEWER: Of what was happening in his trial.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: What, to him?

INTERVIEWER: Yeah. Do you think it was intended by himself?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah. So if he had just carried on living it wouldn’t have had the big bang, would it, at the end. It’s like a having a movie without having that bit at the end. It’s got to have that. And I think he knew he was going to die. Well, I mean because otherwise he’d have just lived and grown old, he wouldn’t have become a martyr. It’s like these people who die young.

You know, they become stars, you know what I mean. Like if you’re Morrison and all these people like James Dean and all these people, when you die young you’re elevated to a certain status, you know, the Jesus Christ status really. It’s true. And so you can’t just grow old like fucking Paul McCartney. That’d just be shit. Like yeah so I did a few miracles and did some stuff. Don’t really do it so much anymore. I’d just stay in Jerusalem, you know, if he was alive now, he’d be like all these— like all these evangelistic priests in America have got big stages and TV channels. Hopefully Jesus wouldn’t do that if he came back now, but I’m sure he would, I’m sure he’d be on Sky TV and all that shit.

INTERVIEWER: Do you believe that your art is more sacred or profane?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: More what?

INTERVIEWER: Sacred or profane.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I wouldn’t say it’s sacred.

INTERVIEWER: Why?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well, I think that’s too egotistical of me to say it’s sacred. It’s just my opinion of how I see things. It’s not; I wouldn’t say it’s sacred. It’s just my viewpoint and how I feel. I think for anyone to say their art is sacred is a bit odd really.

INTERVIEWER: You could say that DaVinci’s art is sacred.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: But I mean that’s how we view it though, isn’t it?

INTERVIEWER: Well sacred in a personal sense.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Sacred.

INTERVIEWER: Yeah, sacred in a personal sense of the term, so sacred to reveal truthfulness and sacred to your original system…

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Okay, so in that sense yeah, it might be sacred. I think I was thinking sacred in terms of being holy or something. That’s what the connotations of that word means to me. But yeah, I guess I hear what you’re saying. But yeah, I mean I think I was thinking of more like divine actually. I think some people can see artwork as being divine which is fair enough. But as an artist, I wouldn’t say my work is divine.

INTERVIEWER: I mean, what does divine mean. It means that—.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: It’s on a high level though, isn’t it?

INTERVIEWER: It’s just something that’s on a high level and unintelligible to the conscious mind when created. So art is divine when it’s truthful to the original making and to the artist himself. That’s why we were talking about channeling.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Yeah just, for me it’s quite a strong word, it’s quite a loaded word, so I wouldn’t choose to use—I mean I can’t speak for other artists but I wouldn’t call my own work divine.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think that you release, that one actually releases the evil or that an artist releases the evil in making art or is it an act of purity in the making?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I don’t really, I’m not sure if I believe in evil as such. I think it’s a word we’ve kind of termed for people who are bad people. Like psychopaths, I don’t think they’re evil I just think they’re incredibly, they’re messed up, but that’s because parts of their brain are not connecting, they’re ill. Purity makes a bit more sense to me to use that word because I think purity makes me think of if something’s honest. So that could be released. But to put evil into an artwork. I mean, I don’t know, I guess the swastika could represent evil, someone using an image and doing extremely bad things and using that one image to represent what they do, I mean it has connotations of being evil. But it’s loaded isn’t it. The American flag or Mickey Mouse could be evil to certain other people in parts of this planet. We all have our different viewpoints, how we see imagery.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think that we can have different viewpoints on what is evil or pure or is there an overwhelming order that revolves around a sense or a defining—.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well I think that’s sort of about cultures again and contexts because what’s pure to me means something different to someone in another country.

INTERVIEWER: How about morality?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Morality. I think that’s kind of similar again. I think there’s an underlying knowing of what is good or bad and how you treat people but again, if you talk to a Christian, their idea of morality is going to be very different from someone who is in a strip joint in Las Vegas. I’m not saying that what they’re doing is wrong; it’s just different viewpoints isn’t it. We’re just playing cards.

INTERVIEWER: When was the time in your life where you felt the closest to a supreme force?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Any supreme force?

INTERVIEWER: Yeah, whichever one you think about when you think of—.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well, lately I’ve become quite spiritual. I wouldn’t call it supreme force though, I’d just say it’s, I think just being spiritual, feeling spiritual is about being connected to something which, for me, feels quite organic and connected to this planet and other people. But to use words like supreme force, for me, I mean that sort of language which religions use; I think that’s where you get into dangerous grounds of idealization and higher beings. I don’t think there should be a higher being.

INTERVIEWER: Or a supreme order.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Or a supreme order. Yeah. I don’t know. That scares me, words like supreme order, definitions and terms like that because I think we should all try to live happily together really. There shouldn’t be any one supreme order. That’s the trouble when you have like groups of friends and they want to join a cult and then you join a cult and there’s like chief priests and a cult leader and you have a supreme leader and you’re just like ‘Oh, I thought we were just friends hanging out and all of a sudden I’m not allowed in your flat unless I give you a tenner’. You know, it gets a bit mixed up. Yeah, it sounds, I don’t know.

INTERVIEWER: How many people can you trust?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: What do you mean? I’m an artist. I’ve got lots of good friends, six, seven. Just answer the question. It’s written funny. Yeah. What do you mean?

INTERVIEWER: Seven?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: I’ve got some good friends. Yeah.

INTERVIEWER: And you trust them all?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: To relative degrees, yeah, yeah. What? Is this about me or the interview? That’s really funny.

INTERVIEWER: Jesus does trust his apostles.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Oh yeah, well hopefully they were good friends of his. I fucking hope so.

INTERVIEWER: One of them betrays him though.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Well, money talks right, so you know.

INTERVIEWER Do you trust yourself?

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Twelve pieces of silver. Do I trust myself?

INTERVIEWER: Yeah.

ANTHONY MICALLEF: Most of the time. Do I trust myself? Yeah, I think I know when I’m doing something I shouldn’t do. But I just tend to ignore that. Yeah. Should we go and see the piece?