Located in The centre of the Mediterranean, between Europe and Africa, Malta and Sicily have attracted the curiosity and interest of travellers. Both islands share similar territorial morphology, climate, flora and rock formations as well as historical links the result of centuries old commercial intercourse and archaeological remains and archival documentation testify intense cultural cross-fertilization.

Throughout the Middle Ages up to the arrival of the Knights of St John in 1530 Malta was closely linked to the Kingdom of Sicily then part of the Crown of Aragon. The presence of a famous chivalry and crusading religious order of knights, devoted to the defence of Christendom and the care of the sick fired the imagination of travellers and promoted a form of cultural tourism in the centre of the Mediterranean basin.

Sicily and its surrounding islands acted as a stepping-stone between mainland Europe and Malta. In the process of reaching Malta travellers discovered a rich and variegated kaleidoscopic civilisation with roots embedded in classical antiquity reflected by impressive Greek temples and Roman remains, Byzantine, Islamic and Medieval architecture and art that recalled the heroic gests of Paladins, Saracens and Normans. A fascinating landscape, delimited by a blue sea and sky and punctuated by natural phenomena salient amongst which were Volcanoes. This was a land of contrasts and contradictions inhabited by resolute and proud people with an intense sense of honour and hospitality.

In Malta the traveller was confronted by a cosmopolitan society, the spectacle constituted by the Knights themselves (scions of the best European nobility), their military and civil organisation, hospital, fortifications, churches and architecture, spectacular natural harbours, a strange apparent barren landscape which nonetheless bore fruit and a people who spoke a bizarre language and whose customs and traditions appear like a microcosm of Mediterranean civilisations. This was a people with a well-established social order of merchants, hardy seafarers, craftsmen, peasants, its own nobility and professional classes all staunchly Catholics. Here was the last bulwark that defended and delimited the frontier between Christendom and Islam. Malta was an exotic and yet familiar medley, made poignant by the fascinating and mysterious existence of gigantic cyclopean stone structures considered by some, at the time, as antediluvian and Phoenician by others.

No gentleman's education, in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, was considered complete without having, at least once, travelled to the Mediterranean in what is known as the "Grand Tour". In the course of the age of enlightenment there developed a need for scientific knowledge, which could only be satisfied through direct personal experience and observation and careful annotation of events, sights and sounds experienced by individual travellers. Thus in 1664 the Dutch artist Willem Schellincks (1627-1678) accompanied the young gentleman Jacques Thierry on a tour of Malta and Sicily resulting in a journal and a series of splendid sketches that give an insight of the islands in the late 17th century.

However, in the 18th and 19th centuries there came about a strong demand for the publication of accounts and travelogues. Voyage Pictoresque des Isles de Sicile, Lipari et de Malta was produced and published in four volumes in Paris by the French painter and engraver Jean Pierre Houel
(1735-1813) between the years 1781 and 1786. This splendid publication, lavishly illustrated, was the result of Houel's own experiences, observations and sketches made during his four-year stay in Sicily, Lipari, Malta and Gozo. Houel's book was the factor that inspired the project VOYAGE & VOIR.

Heritage Malta, The Valletta Rehabilitation Project, the Comune di Palazzolo Acreide, province of Syracuse, Sicily, the Associazione Jean Houel and the Centro Studi e Iniziative per lo Sviluppo Locale ed Integrato (CE.S.I.S) supported by the Regione Sicilia; have pooled their resources with the objective of embarking on the rediscovery of the 18th century "Grand Tour" routes which fomented awareness of the common natural, historical and cultural patrimony shared by Malta and Sicily.

The aim is to trigger forms of co-operation between the two parties through the creation of new specialized cultural tourism circuits inspired by the "Grand Tour". This will hopefully foment innovative initiatives leading to a fastening of common past and present links through the evaluation and promotion of common cultural environmental resources with a view strengthening the singular identities of both islands for the mutual social and economic advancement of the people of Malta and Sicily and the satisfaction and cultural enrichment of modern day travellers.

Link to VOYAGE & VOIR website