This article was originally published in BPM Magazine. Read the full version of the magazine here.
Facing the World, Literally
You’ve seen her everywhere – in bars, on traffic signs, next to graffiti, all around Malta. Who is Benzorella? Or better yet, what is Benzorella? We didn’t ask how is Benzorella, but we did ask the woman that created her.
She’s absolutely grand, upbeat, and a pleasure to be around. We sat down with the artist behind one of Malta’s most mysterious faces, in hopes that we might learn a bit more about this puzzling project.
Long after, the artist realised, ‘Wow, this is actually really cool’, and went above and beyond to perfect an old illustration. ‘I redid it around 50 times’.
Wanting to leave the house and do something that didn’t involve partying, she recognised that there weren’t a lot of people who do this (putting up mysterious stickers in random places) and decided to explore that idea. ‘I just used to put the headphones on and get myself all glued up and that was it’.
‘I’m still doing something that I’m not supposed to but I also know it’s not hurting anyone so I still enjoy it and I take a lot of pride in seeing it around.
Whenever I see someone scratching it off, it gives me a drive to go back and put another one. I hope this doesn’t sound cocky, I never meant to instigate anything in the viewer, it was really something that I started to do for myself because I liked it and I like seeing it around. I know that people see it and they’re confused and they want to know more’.
She certainly had us confused, which is why we had to know more about the mystery of it. We were positively surprised to find out that the mind behind Benzorella is a high-energy, ‘100% corporate girly’ who does things spontaneously and enjoys life to the fullest.
Like a lot of unconventional projects, her concept was met with a degree of scrutiny from a group of people you’d least expect to criticise this idea: graffiti artists.
‘I felt doubtful in the beginning when I had some local graffiti artists reach out to me telling me not to go to a particular location because ‘I was not an artist’ and putting up stickers ‘is not graffiti’. Initially, I was really taken aback by it. So, the way that I turned this around was, ‘I’m never going there again, but Gżira becomes mine!’’
This drive, she says, is a result of her ‘relentless anger and call to action’. Non Una di Meno can be found on Rue D’Argens, as a reminder to stand up against abuse, injustice, and other unacceptable behaviour.
So, there you have it. Now you know the concept behind this mysterious face. Mischievous, millennial, and ‘sticky’, the creator of Benzorella will keep on doing what she does outside of Malta, as her stickers conquer Europe and beyond.
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