ARJAN SHEHAJ

The sign matrix, essentiality and gestural reduction outline the poetics of Arjan Shehaj (Patos, Albania, 1989), who uses different materials and supports to create paintings and works on paper with neutral backgrounds. Drawing inspiration from oriental calligraphy and in the wake of Italian informal trends of the second half of the 20th century, the artist creates synthetic works where a set of strokes of various colors overlap and expand on the surface, evoking minimal, sometimes filamentous natural forms, celestial constellations and groupings, indeterminate spaces and pulviscular atmospheres. Even in the painting in the competition, made with water-based colors in delicate tones of light blue, blue and violet, to which other color gradations are added, visible at a close distance according to a slow process of perception, the artist creates an intricate and vibrant universe of intersections and overlaps. From the center extend fluid, arched, concave and convex lines that generate a centrifugal motion, where the stroke becomes lighter, rarefied, airy, as revealed by the work's title Formë e Pacaktuar - “indefinite form,” translated from Albanian. “The key to interpreting the work,” Shehaj declares, ”is subject to the interpretation of the observer, who draws forms and shadows into his or her own subjective experience. On the other hand, experiencing our days is not a path of certainty, but an approach, step by step, from the mental chaos of today to a utopian tomorrow.”