If the Hat Fits the Suit, 2016
wood, metal, plaster, 200 x 200 x 120 cm
production: TICA, Albania
curator: Stefano Romano
The pyramid, built as a memorial to Enver Hoxha and later a center of trade fairs and cultural activities now closed and left to itself is perhaps the most particular architecture in Albania. The decrepit building resembling an empty tomb of a ghost in the center of the Tirana. It’s a “walkable” building, meaning that everybody feels the irresistible urge to climb its slopes to reach the top. Maybe inspired by its physical and tactile features, Nikolić decided to realize IF THE HAT FITS THE SUIT, a sculpture made with secondhand materials, wood, iron, plaster, and other, flpping the building upside down, turning it into an “im-ploded” pyramid whose way is no longer ascending but descending. The viewer’s gaze moves from the top of the sculpture and edges down to the bottom, where a red star is located that, perhaps a little melancholically, shows itself to the viewer from the bottom of a story which is now part of Albania’s past. It stands as witness to the common roots of modern Albanian and Balkan’s history that divided and united, but that cannot be ignored to understand who we are today.
An excerpt from the text by curator Stefano Romano