On May 31th, Harabel Contemporary hosted a talk with artist Adrian Paci and curator Dr. Kobi Ben-Meir who presented the project Broken Words and the exhibition Adrian Paci: Still Voices. The talk took place at Harabel’s premises.

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The exhibition, on view at Haifa Museum of Art, is a wide survey of video works by world-renowned Albanian artist Adrian Paci, starting with his earliest work from 1997 and concluding with two world premieres of his recent works from 2021.

Ben-Meir presented works by Paci exploring the primacy of body language over verbal language in the artist’s oeuvre, while focusing on his 2018 work Broken Words, that at the end of the project will be acquired by the Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci. Via sensitive aesthetic research of the medium of video, Paci fills textual voids with images and sounds that articulate what words fail to communicate.

Photo credits: Adrian Paci, Broken Words, 2018, 6:49 min, Courtesy of the artist, Kaufmann Repetto Milan, New York, and Galerie Peter Kilchmann, Zürich, Project realized with the support of Italian Council (2021).

This project was supported by the Italian Council (10th edition, 2021), a program to promote Italian contemporary art around the world by the Directorate-General for Contemporary Creativity of the Italian Ministry of Culture.

About the guests:

Dr. Kobi Ben-Meir is the Chief Curator of Haifa Museum of Art, one of the largest cultural institutions in Israel. Before joining the Haifa Museum of Art in 2021, Ben-Meir worked for 17 years at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem, in diverse curatorial and educational positions. Ben-Meir is a scholar of contemporary art, and earned his PhD from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Between 2017 and 2019 he served as a research fellow at the Department of Art History of the Free University of Berlin.

Adrian Paci (born in 1969 in Shkodër, Albania) studied painting at the Academy of Arts of Tirana. In 1997 he moved to Milan where he lives and works. 

Throughout his career he held numerous solo shows in various international institutions such as: Kunsthalle Krems (2019); Museo Novecento, Florence (2017) MAC, Musée d’Art Contemporain de Montréal (2014); Padiglione d’Arte Contemporanea – PAC, Milan (2014); Jeu de Paume, Paris (2013); Kunsthaus Zurich, Zurich (2010); Bloomberg Space, London (2010); The Center for Contemporary Art – CCA, Tel Aviv (2009); Museum am Ostwall, Dortmund (2007); MoMA PS1, New York (2006) and Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston (2005). Amongst the various group exhibitions, Adrian Paci’s work has also been featured in the 14th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia (2014); in the 48th and the 51st edition of the International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia (respectively in 1999 and 2005); in the 15th Biennale of Sydney (2006); in the 15th Quadriennale di Roma, where he won first prize (2008); in the Biennale de Lyon (2009); and in the 4th Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art (2013).

Adrian Paci teaches painting and Visual Arts at Nuova Accademia di Belle Arti NABA, Milan. He has been teaching art classes at Accademia Carrara di Belle Arti Bergamo, 2002-2006, IUAV, Venice 2003-2015 and has been giving lectures and workshops in many Universities, Art Academies and Institutions in different countries.