Gozo Saints Go Global: New MaltaPost Stamps Put Festa Statues on Every Envelope

**Gozo’s Stone Saints Go Postal: New MaltaPost Festa Stamps Celebrate Island’s Living Tradition**

Victor Camilleri’s garage in Xagħra smells of paraffin and sawdust. For 35 years the 68-year-old has carved, sanded and painted the statues that will be hoisted on shoulders in August for the feast of the Assumption. This summer, however, his workshop has become an unlikely photo studio. MaltaPost photographers squeezed between halos and half-finished angels to capture the face of Gozo’s festa culture for a new set of stamps that will travel far beyond the narrow village streets they depict.

The €0.30 to €2.50 stamp sheet, issued today and already selling fast at counters from Valletta to Victoria, features six of Gozo’s most beloved titular statues: the Madonna ta’ Pinu, St George of Rabat, the Assumption of Xagħra, St Mary of Żebbuġ, St Joseph of Xewkija and the Nativity of Nadur. Each miniature vignette is framed by a burst of confetti colours taken from real ħruġ photographs shot during last year’s feasts, a deliberate nod to the smoke-and-petard nights that define Maltese summers.

“People forget that these statues are not museum pieces,” said MaltaPost philatelic manager Roberta Grech as she unveiled the issue at the Gran Castello Historic House. “They are carried, kissed, wept over, patched up after a windy procession. We wanted the stamps to feel alive.”

The project began 18 months ago when postmen in Gozo complained that mainland stamp collectors kept asking for “something Gozitan” beyond the generic Maltese cross. A quick survey in three village bars—Ta’ Rikardu, Ta’ Philip and the Nadur band club—produced a wish-list heavy on saints. Rather than re-issue vintage black-and-white images, MaltaPost decided to photograph the statues in their natural habitat: the parish workshops where volunteers repaint eyebrows, re-gild staffs and argue over lace collars.

The timing is no accident. With tourism rebounding and festa committees still rebuilding coffers hit by COVID cancellations, the stamps double as miniature ambassadors. Each first-day cover includes a QR code linking to a map of 2024 feast dates and a 30-second video of the respective village brass band blasting through the marċ tal-banda. “It’s soft power,” said Xagħra mayor Christian Zammit. “A letter posted in Melbourne with our Assumption on it does more than any billboard.”

Local sculptors hope the exposure translates into commissions. The island’s last professional statue maker, 82-year-old Ġanni Xuereb from Żebbuġ, watched the launch on Facebook Live. “My phone hasn’t stopped buzzing,” he laughed. “A woman from Canada wants a 15-centimetre replica of St Joseph for her wedding cake.” Xuereb’s original 1959 statue of St Joseph, carved from a single lime-wood trunk, features on the €1 stamp; he will sign 200 special envelopes after Sunday mass, proceeds going to the Żebbuġ children’s band.

Not everyone is celebrating. Nadur’s feast president, Marica Camilleri, grumbled that the stamps show the 1844 statue wearing last year’s cape, already replaced by a new burgundy one embroidered by parishioners. “Collectors will think we still dress our Madonna in faded red,” she sighed. Others fear the philatelic glory will inflate already sky-high auction prices for antique festa memorabilia. A 1923 Xewkija procession banner fetched €4,000 on Facebook Marketplace last month.

Still, queues outside the Victoria post office snaked around the corner at 7 a.m. Many buyers were grandparents mailing letters to grandchildren abroad, slipping in a stamp instead of a €20 note. “It’s cheaper than a souvenir, and it carries our story,” said Pawlu Pace, 74, clutching sheets fresh off the printer. Inside, clerk Kimberley Attard, 22, wore festive earrings shaped like tiny petards. “Young people don’t write letters,” she admitted, “but they’re buying these to stick on laptops and skateboards.”

By midday MaltaPost’s online shop had crashed twice. The print run—80,000 stamps, modest compared to Christmas issues—is expected to sell out within weeks. A second run is unlikely; philatelic tradition dictates scarcity drives demand. Meanwhile, Victor Camilleri is back in his garage, touching up the Assumption’s eyelashes before next month’s procession. “I never thought my Madonna would travel the world licked on an envelope,” he smiled, holding the stamp beside the real thing. “But now she’s gone global, I’d better get her eyebrows straight.”