Solo Show

Mitterrand Temple, Paris, presents the fifth solo exhibition of Edi Hila, an artist born in 1944 in Shkodër, Albania. The exhibition features new works that explore the relationship between memory, architecture, and perception, with painting serving as a bridge between the real and the symbolic. Hila's practice, developed over decades, uses pictorial material as a space for reflection on history and the human condition. Trained under the communist dictatorship, he developed a distinct style independent of prevailing systems, questioning social and psychological transformations without direct protest.

The new paintings are inspired by the mountainous landscape of southeastern Albania, depicting suspended spaces where elements like staircases, facades, mountains, and valleys merge. Classical perspectives are fragmented, suggesting a sense of a closed world. Hila views this approach to landscape as an internal metaphor, delving into the "chambers of the soul" and "buried memories." The works are characterized by a balance between compositional rigor and soft tones, creating a "poetry of matter." Hila describes his work as a paradoxical realism, where painting offers an alternative reality born from observation and memory, transforming everyday elements into symbolic fragments that explore the balance between past and present.