Kosovo (Republic of) 2026

Title: Hard Teeth (Dhëmbë të Fortë)
Commissioner: National Gallery of Kosovo, Hana Halilaj
Curator: José Esparza Chong Cuy
Exhibitor: Brilant Milazimi

The presentation features an immersive painting installation staged within the Chiesa di Santa Maria del Pianto.

The body of work centres on a 17-metre-long landscape painting depicting a line of figures standing closely together across mountains that evoke the rural terrain of Kosovo. The installation, mounted on a self-standing structure designed by LANZA, gathering frail bodies in a scene resembling a procession. These figures appear to persist and wait with their teeth tightly clenched, though the object of their waiting remains unnamed.

The work explores a suspension of time and destination, reflecting decades of lived indeterminacy shaped by political transition and processes of sovereignty. “Hard Teeth” aims to give form to the physical and psychological strain of endurance without resolution, capturing an atmosphere of collective feelings through its expansive visual narrative.