Some unashamed use of Ai here. The intention behind this gallery was to give some life to some historic monochrome views, and to bring some composite photos together in an engaging and convincing manner.

The composites bring together modern or historic photographs with collaged elements from other historic railway images. The concept’s not new; the cover of Bonnici & Cassar’s book on the Malta Railway superimposed Locomotive No.5  into another photo showing Porta Reale gate.

The two created scenes capture the view towards Mdina from Ta’ San Gabku, and the railway bridge near Portes des Bombes. The first I’ve featured here before as a beautiful fiction. The basis for the second is a modern photo with a Malta Railway train and the famous double gate being cut-out and inserted. Work had to be done to reveal Portes des Bombes from behind the trees that have grown up since the railway’s time.

What all four of the images have in common is that the Ai prompt required the images to be created in the manner of Maltese artist Edward Caruana Dingli. Dingli was the foremost artist in Malta in the first decades of the 20^th Century, though is never known to have painted the railway. His style is characterised by rich colours and human interest, often documenting aspects of Maltese life in his work.

Two historic images were selected for this treatment: the well-known photograph taken at the level crossing chain outside Birkirkara station, with engine No.4 hauling a Valletta-bound train and a train posed over Princess Melita Avenue, a more recent discovery.

The ambition in these renderings is not to deceive, but to add colour and life to railway’s history. Hopefully, avoiding generic photo ‘colourisation’ of these illustrations gives them their own authenticity as imaginary images, in the same way as any Historicist artwork might be viewed.