Iva Lulashi

With out-of-focus contours, pastel palettes and dreamlike, soft porn atmospheres, Lulashi’s works seem to correspond to what the Austrian writer Arthur Schnitzler, author of Dream Story, said about poetry: “To trace as far as possible the limits between conscious, semi-conscious and unconscious: in this consists the art of the poet.” Lulashi marks out the indefinite line between consciousness and unconsciousness and crosses it by depicting blurred and sombre visions of memories and desires, culled from erotic or propaganda films. Mixing personal and collective memories, Lulashi transforms these images into gestures of resistance, opposing the freedom identified with eroticism to the interference of totalitarian ideologies. This is seen in Visibile e mobile (Visible and Mobile,) where two lovers shyly approach each other  in a bucolic setting. Against patriarchal dominance, Lulashi overturns the narrative point of view, as does the mysterious and threatening protagonist of Le disavventure della virtù (The misadventures of virtue).

Iva Lulashi (Tirana, 1988) She studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice and she was resident at Viafarini, Milan. She has exhibited in solo shows: Passione cola passione scorre (2021) and Vicino e altrove at Prometeogallery, Milano (2020); Love as a glass of water at Salzburger Kunstverein, Salzburg (2018) and Frames at Villa Rondinelli, Florence (2017) and in group shows: Ti Bergamo at GAMeC, Bergamo (2020); Ciò che vedo at Mart, Rovereto (2020); BienNolo, Milan (2019) and Biennale Mediterranea, Tirana (2018).