Petrit Halilaj Installation at Reina Sofia's Palacio de Cristal

Petrit Halilaj. To a raven and hurricanes that from unknown places bring back smells of humans in love, 2020. Exhibition view at Palacio de Cristal. Courtesy of the artist and © Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid. Photo by ImagenSubliminal (Miguel de Guzmán and Rocío Romero).

Petrit Halilaj has turned Reina Sofia‘s Palacio de Cristal in Madrid into a nest filled with giant flowers, producing a “piece of his life”. As visitors move throughout Halilaj’s first solo exhibition in Spain, titled ‘To a raven and the hurricanes which bring back smells of humans in love from unknown places’, their awareness of the outside world is heightened. The artist curates an environment that acts as a bridge between the interior and the exterior, existing as a strange extension of the present. Halilaj has designed a space that allows him to explore key elements that make up his own personal biography, his relationship to his home, nation, love, and cultural identity all becoming distilled within the exhibition.

Halilaj is a Kosovar artist who’s work is hugely influenced by his life experiences. His childhood memories, informed by life as a refugee, and the political and social tensions within his country, all interwoven throughout his pieces. His work explores complex themes, encouraging deep reflection in all those who encounter him.

The open windows of the Palacio de Cristal’s glass façade invite the outside in – allowing birds and other creatures to inhabit the space. Birds are a reoccurring feature of his work, “symbolising the transgression of the limits established by modern thought between subject and object, culture and nature.” Halilaj particularly references the extraordinary courtship ritual of bowerbirds in the piece, drawing upon their elaborately decorated ‘bower’ structures used to attract a male.

Petrit Halilaj at Reina Sofia Madrid, Palacio De Cristal, Installation Art | Yellowtrace

The nest is described by exhibition curators as “a continuation of its environment, its visitors and their activities. Moreover, there is something strange and disproportionate about the size of this nest, the gigantic scale of its flowers, and the comfort and centrality it offers the birds. The artist thus suspends the logocentric perspective that makes us believe we are the centre and measure of all things.”

Large flowers made of delicate steel framework and painted canvas hang from the ceiling, their beautiful forms the result of the collaboration of Halilaj and his life partner, artist Álvaro Urbano. The flowers, Forsythia, palm seeds, cherry blossoms, poppies, carnations, and lilies, stand as a celebration of their relationship with Halilaj declaring – “I wanted to conceive Palacio de Cristal as a place for the celebration of love.”

The exhibition is the first display within the Museo Reina Sofia since its closure due to COVID-19. It’s timing perfectly captures the acceptance that comes out of times of uncertainty and struggle. The current worldwide crisis has shown us all of the fragility of our planet – both the economic systems we have created and the natural environment that surrounds us. In a time of vulnerability, “Halilaj offers a refuge, and so raises hope for a possible future different to the one apparently awaiting us”.

[Images courtesy of the artist and © Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid. Photography by ImagenSubliminal (Miguel de Guzmán and Rocío Romero).]