Interview Questions by Graciela Zhang
Interview Answers by Alkan Nallbani
Alkan Nallbani was born in Berat, Albania, and spent most of his adult life living and painting in Italy. He graduated with top honors from the Academy of Fine Arts in Tirana, continuing his education at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence, Italy and the Corcoran College of Art and Design, in Washington, D.C. His work focuses on oil paintings, drawings and etchings, and moves between representative and abstract styles. Alkan maintains studios in Tribeca, NY and Florence, Italy. He was invited to participate in the Harnett Biennial in 2010 and Prague Biennial in 2009, and has had numerous solo and group exhibitions in Europe and the United States.
Graciela Zhang (GZ): Your journey as an artist began under the communist Albanian regime, which strictly censored contemporary art. So how did growing up in that kind of environment encourage you to be more drawn to freedom, and pursue it more desperately than others?
Alkan Nallbani (AN): In my early years, especially starting from eighth grade when I decided to become an artist until the end of high school, my idea about freedom was strictly modest, because for me, freedom at the time was whatever was presented to me, and the regime's rules looked like a normal reality.
What happened then is that when I went to the Academy of Fine Arts in Tirana, I was involved and engaged with different intellectual groups and artists, and I saw that there was another way in the world, the Western world with its own concept of freedom and democracy. In the beginning, it was challenging to absorb all these aspects, but later on, I started embracing them and being part of it.
It was important, this freedom of expression I learned later in life; for many people in general, artists in particular, freedom of expression is something they grow with. They hurt all the time. For me, it started later in life, when I was probably in my freshman year at the Academy. I learned about possibilities, many possibilities, apart from just strict rules of drawing and painting, thinking and writing. My head and brain started opening up to this concept, freedom of expression, and I also embraced whatever challenges I could apply to my work and especially to my life.
GZ: In one of your published essays, you mentioned that under the strict Albanian regime, you and your group found underground books on art. That happened during the Academy times, right?
AN: Yes. Before getting into the Academy, I started going to Tirana, taking courses, meeting with professors, and showing them my work. One of them was my uncle, who was also a professor at the Academy. They were like an elite group of intellectuals and artists, and they had already started to be open to information coming from the Western world. In the beginning, they would talk, but also books from different artists would circulate in that environment. And being in his home, going to visit, I started learning about these artists.
I remember it had a really great impact on me; some artists that I had never heard of before, like a metaphysical artist called Giorgio de Chirico, and my uncle had a huge retrospective book of his work. I was amazed by his career and all his artworks. Also, at the time, I got books about surrealism, Dali or Picasso or Matisse, things I had never heard of before. By then, I was almost an adult in my early 20s, but I started late. However, still, in that kind of excitement, I felt almost like a child opening those new present boxes, and that was kind of like a big step for me in discovering this present coming underground from the Western world.
GZ: How exactly did surrealism impact you as an artist?
AN: Surrealism consists of a period of my life when I was a teenager. In the early years, when you’re a dreamer, you create this parallel world, and you start discovering and going deeper into your mind unconsciously. Surrealism was one of the reasons that I made my trip to find my dreams very quickly and connected. Most of my early works, at the time, were about surrealism.
Also, since we were dreamers through surrealism, I think you can extend your dream to almost infinity. Everything that you thought before, you can push it farther. Maybe that was because we were young and big dreamers at the time, and surrealism fulfilled that requirement, that hunger that we had and the desire to grow and dream big. At the time, it was a style that consisted more of my existence as an artist.
GZ: You mentioned how dreams supported you in that period of time. Then, do you believe in the power of dreams now?
AN: I think, as an artist, you always have to be open to the possibility of a bigger dream. When I was in my college years, we had really big dreams, maybe too big for the time, and we often risked our lives for those dreams.
And in respect to those dreams, in respect to what I was, I hold myself responsible for dreaming again or keeping my dreams continuing, growing, or developing, but never forgetting, despite the everyday reality and requirements of normal life pushing you in a direction. The artist that is in me can never forget that time, and I carry it through every place I've been and every place I will go.
GZ: You mentioned the risk involved in pursuing those dreams. What were those risks?
AN: In the early years of the Academy, freedom of speech and freedom of expression were not allowed. We, as students, started a movement to change the rules, to change the regime. Being dreamers, we didn't really count the risks, and maybe they were too big. I think a normal person would not do it, but at the time, the ideals were better and bigger than everything else. And we took those risks and started the student revolution. We finished with a change of the regime and a change of the path of the country.
After that, another risk that I took was when I had to decide whether or not to stay in Albania, figuring out how to survive, or take the risk of going on a boat and landing in Italy and trying my fortune in a Western country that was not expecting me, or was not trying to help me. But it was something I was looking for and trying for in my next step as an artist. I went to Italy without any help, without money or any support, and without knowing the language, which means it was a really crazy risk to take to face a new reality.
Back home in Albania, I had a relatively normal family, a good family, and a good environment. I couldn't stay there, and I wanted to grow and discover these dreams I had when I was a teenager or in my years at the Academy. I didn't stop despite all the risks that I knew I had to face in the future.
Coming to the U.S. was also a risk. I was leaving Florence, a beautiful town. I had the job and everything, but I wanted to risk more. I wanted to grow and find a place that I had always dreamed of when I was in college. My first books were from the Museum of Modern Art by abstract expressionists like Pollock, de Kooning, and Franz Kline, and those dreams grew in me.
I have always dreamed of coming to the U.S., coming to New York, and seeing all these things in person. I dream, and I follow them. I follow those dreams despite the risks during my journey.
GZ: Looking back, do you feel the risks were well-taken, or do you feel sometimes you didn't need to take those risks to become who you are today?
AN: I am the person that I am today because of those risks. I think, without these risks, I don't know what I was going to become, or where I was going to be.
The risks are a very exciting aspect of my work because there’s something there to achieve, something to overcome, and also, most importantly, it’s just to win over our inner self. Because the risk is also fear—fear of failure, fear of not achieving, fear of not succeeding, and fear of losing—and all those are very exciting aspects for me to overcome, and that's a reason I constantly take risks.
Here in my environment, life is more or less settled. But every six months, I take a risk. I want to risk something, but in a smaller way: I take a trip, I visit new places, I do a new exhibition with new challenges in new countries, new galleries, or new museums. Just the risk. Every six months, I try to change my surroundings.
GZ: At any point in your life, did you ever miss Albania—the old Albania?
AN: I don't miss anything about Albania under the communist rule, but I miss Albania, where I grew up. I missed the street I grew up on. I missed my friends that I grew up with. I miss my grandma who passed away. I miss the small world that we had, the kind of little things that we enjoyed at the time. I have more now, but it doesn't mean that I can be as happy as I was when I was little with my friends and our games and our place outdoors. Those are things that you cannot return to and things that you cannot find wherever you go. Regime-wise, I don't miss it at all. But I miss my childhood, that Albania. When I go back, everything is more modern. Everything is more westernized. And I don't really have any excitement when I go back to find those. Here, there, I find little pieces of that childhood time, and I really hold onto it. It reasonably makes me return back every year to find what is left of my childhood.
Graciela Zhang is from Beijing, China. Her writing and artwork have been recognized by the New York Times, the Alliance for Young Artists and Writers, and StoryStudio Chicago. In her free time, she enjoys cooking and playing tennis.
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