Albania special (1): does Tirana want modern art?

Europe's last cultural secret, is how Albania is also known. Mainly because the small Balkan country was shielded from the rest of Europe for a long time: until the communist totalitarian regime fell in 1991. How does such a change affect its culture? I become fascinated by this question during my holiday and speak to a number of people. Including our own ambassador, Dewi van de Weerd.

The Dutch ambassador to Albania sits dressed spick and span in the corner of the sofa in her study. She is in her forties, has an impressive LinkedIn profile and has been stationed in the capital Tirana since the beginning of this year. She enjoys explaining Albania's culture. Because she loves art, she says.

There are links between Dutch and Albanian culture, says the ambassador. The book The cross of oblivion by Albanian writer Fluktura Acka was praised here. Netherlands-based architectural firm Casanova-Hernandez won a tender for a photo museum in the town of Shkodër and Dutch architecture firm Boom designed A pier in the port city of Durres.

The ambassador is impressed by the pier, which is now surprisingly widely used by locals. But above all, she loves Albanian painting with its social realist slant. This is actually remarkable. In 1995, Dutch artist Jan Dibbets was still shocked by the art situation in Albania. He found empty museum walls and considered that a sign of cultural poverty.

Dibbets therefore launched a Voordekunst crowdfunding campaign avant la lettre in 1995. He called on colleagues worldwide to donate works of art to Albania. A somewhat colonial approach according to some Albanians now. According to them, the country had enough art and the 57 donations, an ample yield with works by Karel Appel and Christo, among others, now lie resting in stock at the National Gallery in Tirana.

Dibbets probably mainly meant that he saw little contemporary art in Albania. The Dutch ambassador would therefore like to see a museum of modern art. The obvious person to support such a thing seems to me to be Prime Minister Edi Rama: the former mayor/artist who attracted international attention by painting up old apartment buildings in crazy hues.

That is actually what I am looking for. People taking risks, expressing the transition from a suffocating dictatorship to a market economy. With the rebellious stubbornness typical of the Albanian. For it is still mainly nostalgia for social realism that I encounter. That apparently offers security, looking back on past successes.

More later.

Go to part 2 'This country is a better breeding ground than the Netherlands' (Vincent van Gerven Oy)