Part One
[The interviewer asks the speaker to talk about his early childhood memories. The question was cut from the video—interview.]
Blerim Luzha: I was born in Tirana, on October 25, 1937. I finished elementary school in a few cities because we came back from Tirana in ‘42, I finished [elementary school] in Mitrovica, in Prizren and in Gjakova. Because that’s how my father was placed for work. I was born in Tirana because my father worked for 22 years during King Zog’s time. He was a mayor, prefect and a teacher, he had a few different occupations. Then, I finished Shkolla e Mesme e Artit[1] in 1958.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Were you a big family?
Blerim Luzha: What?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Let’s not go this fast. Were you a big family?
Blerim Luzha: Oh family, too… yes. I come from a family, it was a big family, so my father had three children. I have… actually five children, two boys and three girls. I am the second child, Shpresa was the first, then Fëllanza. Mërgime [whose name means exile], was born in exile because my father was sent to a work camp and he was a political prisoner, yes, and sent to work camp. He was, I mean he spent eight years in prison and in the work camp. So he was a political prisoner because he was accused of working for Albania, because he insisted on the unification of Kosovo with Albania and things like that, but he was never tried.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Was he sent to work a camp in Yugoslavia or Albania?
Blerim Luzha: What?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Was he sent to a work camp in Yugoslavia or Albania?
Blerim Luzha: No, no, he was sent here, because we came here in ‘42. Then, I mean I was alone here at school. I finished school at boarding schools, in dormitories like a person without… because my mother died in ‘44 and I was practically an orphan. Then my father got remarried, and I have two sisters and a brother from my father, and so on. In 1958, 1958 I finished Shkolla Mesme e Artit. Shkolla e Mesme e Artit lasts five years.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: In Peja, or?
Blerim Luzha: In Peja, Shkolla e Artit was in Peja back then, and in the same year I graduated [from Shkolla e Artit] I enrolled at the Academy of Applied Arts in Belgrade. I only applied there formally because I thought I would not get accepted. Out of 320 candidates that applied, that went through the entrance exam, only about 40, 42 students were accepted.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Could you tell us in more detail about Shkolla e Lartë in Peja? I mean Shkolla e Mesme e Artit in Peja? How was it at the time? What did they teach you?
Blerim Luzha: Ah, the program?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: What kind of professional preparation was it?
Blerim Luzha: Shkolla e Mesme e Artit back then was called Shkolla për Zbatimin e Arteve [School of Applied Arts]. I was in the painting department, the school had two other departments, architecture and the wood processing department, as a form of sculpture, applied sculpture. The program of that school was, the whole school was in Serbo—Croatian, whereas we had Albanian language once a week, once a week, so one hour a week, no more. And we didn’t have other professors in our language and so we didn’t have other courses in Albanian, only this. In the year… I’m not sure in the second year or the third year, two Albanian professors came, Shemsedin Kasapolli[2] and Xhevat Gacaferri.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: What did these two teach?
Blerim Luzha: Shemsedin Kasapolli taught us aesthetics. He was a very good teacher, a very, very prepared professor, then later he became a professor at the Academy. He is one of the first people who had a diploma from the Academy of Applied Arts in Belgrade. So we had a feeling that things were good now that someone can speak Albanian, because in the beginning [when everything was in Serbian] we didn’t even speak Serbian well.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: And what were the students, were they… ?
Blerim Luzha: What?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: What background did the students have, were they Albanian or?
Blerim Luzha: You mean the pupils? Because this is high school, we are talking about high school. The pupils, there were a few Albanians, in my class, there were ten of us, ten pupils. A female and three male Albanian pupils. From all of them, it was Masar Nixha and I, he then continued on to Physical Culture and Sports Studies in Belgrade and Rexhë Kelmendi about whom I don’t know anything for a long time because he went to Italy. So 30 percent were Albanians and 70 percent were Serbs and Montenegrins, there were a lot of Montenegrins. Shkolla e Mesme e Artit in ex—Yugoslavia was a renowned school, especially for painting, we had very good professors, very hardworking.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Do you know the names?
Blerim Luzha: How?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Do you know the names?
Blerim Luzha: Of course, Svetozar Kamenović [3]was our teacher, he was a painter from Pirot who was a very good teacher and he wasn’t prejudiced, so he treated us like the others. Vlada Radović[4] was from Peja, he taught us painting, Rufin Lazović. These were professors of professional subjects, we were taught Albanian by Ahmet Meha, Professor Ahmet Meha, who later changed his last name to Kelmendi, probably from Kelmendi fis. [5]And he died actually a couple of years ago, he was a professor here at the Shkolla e Lartë Pedagogjike.[6] The first director was Rista Jovović, a Montenegrin. He was a good man, but then they were not as nationalistically charged as they became later. What else should I say about Shkolla e Artit, I don’t know.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: What kind of education… I mean you were shaped more as a painter, right, at Shkolla e Mesme e Artit in Peja?
Blerim Luzha: So there we had painting as a subject, drawing, action drawing that today we call it the nude, and then the other subjects. Theoretical subjects, art history, French language, then we had color technology, we even had chemistry.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: And regarding the history of art that you were taught at that time, was it Yugoslav or world history?
Blerim Luzha: No, so art history since the Neolithic Period, and Stone Age until modern art, so general art history.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Was this education sufficient to prepare you for admission to Belgrade? The education in Shkolla e Mesme e Artit of Peja, did it prepare you enough so you could then apply to the University in Belgrade?
Blerim Luzha: The matter of university was very problematic, I will tell you, I was anyway the son of a dissident so to say, but even after I graduated, of course with excellent grades, I went and applied to Belgrade. I told you how many candidates there were, I didn’t even dream of getting in. I was assigned to teach figurative art at Mitrovica High School, but luckily I was accepted, it was luck, also my ability, but mostly luck, from 300 and more candidates. Even though Shkolla e Mesme e Artit was renowned for painting in Yugoslavia. So we had good professors.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: How was the enrollment exam, what sort of requirements did they have there?
Blerim Luzha: The enrollment exam in Belgrade? The enrollment exam lasted five days. The enrollment exam lasted five days, we drew a portrait two days, nude one day. Then another day with colors, still lifes. Like this, so it was like general knowledge. And to tell you the truth I chose the Department of Textiles after I got in because of the scholarship. Because otherwise I would not have the chance to get a scholarship, and the textile factory in Gjakova promised me that if I chose textiles [to study] they would provide me with a scholarship.
But then, even though I knew them and they knew my father they didn’t dare accept me, I mean being the son of the enemy, of the [political] prisoner and what do I know… Then, then a politician who was the director of Rilindja, [7]whose name was Asllan Fazlia, a very good man, a communist, but very honorable, and he provided a scholarship for me after eight months. But my father, my father got out of prison when I finished high school. He had said, “I will educate you even if I remain without pots and pans. I will sell the çilim[8] if I have to,” because we were a little rich, çilim cost a lot back then, “and I will not leave you without an education.”
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Çilim…
Blerim Luzha: Speak louder, I can’t hear, I’m deaf…
Erëmirë Krasniqi: I didn’t understand, is it çilim or çirim? What are those?
Blerim Luzha: Textiles, so I mean textiles, in the textile section.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Yes, yes I understood that part but what did your dad say he will sell?
Blerim Luzha: Aa… sell the çilim of the house, the çilim of the house and some furniture just to send me to school. But then Asllan Fazlia gave me the scholarship and there were no more problems. From the second year, towards the end of the second year, the third and the fourth year, and the fifth year, because the Academy lasted five years just like Shkolla e Mesme e Artit lasted five years. I worked at the Belgrade Fair, I did advertising, I drew on the boards, I painted and stuff like this and I didn’t have any financial crises anymore.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Can we go back to how you decided about art, how did you realise? I’m more interested in that, how did you decide to do art?
Blerim Luzha: In the beginning when I went to Shkolla e Mesme e Artit? I had talent, talent. And a cousin of mine who is a popular philosopher, he is still alive even though he is 90 years old. He would look at my paintings and say, “You should go there.” And I went there, I was accepted. I was accepted without problems since I had good drawings because even Shkolla e Mesme e Artit had an enrollment exam.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: So you had to prove yourself there, too. What did you draw at that time, nature? What were you interested in?
Blerim Luzha: Where?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: When you started drawing, what did you draw?
Blerim Luzha: Ah, my first drawings, school drawings, but I also drew portraits and figures and landscapes, still lifes. What kids do, they draw everything. Though, it seems I had talent and that’s why I was accepted.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Do you have anything that you would want to tell us about your student life?
Blerim Luzha: What?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: How was student life in Belgrade?
Blerim Luzha: Throughout student life we were three people in the textile department. A girl who was called Mirjana Marić was my colleague, she became the most popular artist in Yugoslavia, she is still alive but we lost touch. And Mileva Lukić, she was from Aleksinac, and she [Mirjana] was from Belgrade. Her maternal uncle was the ex—Minister of Foreign Affairs, Koča Popović,[9] so they were a good family.
I was with her all the time, we were like brother and sister, and we were three people in the group, so we were together all week. We had professional courses in the morning, and theoretical ones in the afternoon. So, student life, excuse me, student life in the first and second year wasn’t that good for me because I lived only on my scholarship, but then I had no problems so I finished the Academy with excellent grades.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Which years are we talking about, when did the Academy happen?
Blerim Luzha: I finished the Academy in ‘63, 1963. And I finished it with excellent grades. I was the only one with excellent grades in that generation, I won a scholarship from UNESCO at that time. But they asked me, “What kind of specialized studies do you want to do abroad?” As a young man I wanted to travel, we didn’t get to go out of Yugoslavia at that time, you couldn’t leave Yugoslavia without first serving in the army. My dream was to see the world and I chose Japan, Japan because I thought I would go through the Atlantic and come back through the Pacific.
But then I got upset, I got very disappointed because they didn’t give me the passport after I graduated, people from the factory didn’t give it to me. So, the factory, those from the textile factory. So they didn’t dare give it to me. It wasn’t that they didn’t want to give it to me, but they couldn’t. Then I came back from the Academy and I worked in the industry of, in the textile industry, it was called Emin Duraku [10]in Gjakova.
But like every young man I wanted to go abroad and that’s what I thought about, and I read the newspapers every day. I read a newspaper from Belgrade Politika, a daily newspaper. I saw an announcement, because in Europe there were 17 textile fairs organized per month, in some European cities. And I thought I would try to get a passport from the factory and go there. And then I went to the director of the factory and I said to him, “So and so there are 17 textile fairs organized in Europe and that is in the interest of the factory and mine to get the experience, and see what is being printed in Europe.”
You know what, what kind of manufacturing of textiles because Yugoslavia was behind on textiles at that time. He said, “There’s no way because we are in trouble, we have no financial means,” he started complaining, “We are burning out like a pan in heat for money,” and stuff like this so, no, no way. I realised that it wasn’t happening, but I said to him, “Look,” because back then it wasn’t “Sir,” but I said, “Comrade Director, I want to go, I’ll cover my own expenses.” “Just to go, just to go, just to go.” He repeated it three times when I told him that I’d go with my own expenses, because he was relieved. “Yes,” I said. [He asks] “What do you want from us?” I said, “I want to you to provide me with a passport, I can’t go without a passport.” “We’ll try our best.”
I waited, I waited, I waited, the fairs ended. And to tell you the truth I was upset, I was deeply upset because I had, again I thought, I was of the opinion that they would provide me with a passport to go to Japan, even though they refused me once. And so I went to the director and I said, “How, how can you not provide me with a passport to visit these fairs? What can I expect from this factory? I can’t even hope to go to Japan. I have a scholarship, but I don’t have a passport.” Then he consulted with the staff that was in Pristina and he gave me the passport.
And this is also interesting about the passport, because while I was working at the textile factory, I also worked at Shkolla e Mesme e Artit on Fridays and Saturdays. So I only worked at the textile factory four, five days, I worked at Shkolla e Mesme e Artit in Peja. And one day while I was coming back, I went straight home. At the time I lived with my sister, I wasn’t married. She told me, “The people from the Secretariat of the Interior were here and they asked for you, because your passport is ready.” And I was so happy. You are a miss, right? [addresses the interviewer] Miss, Era when (laughs) I said, “How do I go now that the fairs have ended?” (laughs)
I went, I went to my director the next day, the director was not there, there was a deputy, there was a, anyway it is not important, his last name was Rugova. But not like our great Rugova, but he worked at the Secretariat of the Interior. She said to me, “The director waited two hours for you yesterday, he isn’t here today, but I’ll try.” She told me I should be careful, because we have given you the passport, there are migrants and you have some school friends that migrated there and you have to tell us what you talk to them about, you should do this and…
She started to prepare me, I said, “Look I have my own profession, I can’t say much for anyone else.” And I said, “We are young, we are… we go to discos, to balls. I can’t talk about politics and I don’t have the talent because I chose another profession.” And she saw that there’s nothing there and she gave me the passport, “Here, just be careful!” Now I had the passport, but there were no more fairs (laughs). Paris has many stores, from beginning to end it has 80 kilometers, I saw a lot of textiles, it wasn’t that necessary [to go to the fair]. And I took off, I forgot to tell you that as a student in the ‘60s, 1960, as a student at the Academy, our group went to Italy on an excursion and so…
Erëmirë Krasniqi: How did you go there?
Blerim Luzha: What?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: How did you go then?
Blerim Luzha: Then as a group, with one passport. And the moment we got to Venice, I had just put the clothes on the bed, the phone rings. He [the receptionist] says, “Someone is waiting for you downstairs.” I said, “Who is it?” I didn’t know anyone in Venice. I go there, there is a man around 45, 50 years old. He says, “Are you Blerim?” I said, “Yes.” He said, “I heard that you are a patriot, I’ve heard of you, you are a patriot, you are like this, like this and that… we should see what to do about Kosovo.” He was really, he was, excuse me… he was a State Security[11] collaborator, he lived in Italy. He introduced himself as Emilio, he spoke Albanian, very good Elbasan Albanian. “How come you’re not interested in politics? Your father is a patriot and this, and that…”
My father had told me to not talk to any Albanians. He realised there’s nothing here, I said, “Look, you know what I’m interested in, a young girl if there are any, to go to a coffee shop, to get a drink since I’m in Venice for two nights. Go to a ball, I am interested in that.” He realised there’s nothing there, there’s nothing for me. He said, “Look, you’re a good guy, and you’re devoted to your profession.” He said, “There are two popular Albanian painters in Italy.” I said, “Now we’re talking,” I said, “I want to have their addresses. Who are they?” “Ibrahim Kodra [12]and Lin Delija.”[13]
And we parted ways, we had coffee and juice, we parted ways, it was over. When I got back to Belgrade from the excursion a letter with Ibrahim Kodra’s address was waiting for me, but he said he could not provide Lin Delia’s address. And I kept correspondence with Ibrahim Kodra since 1960, even…
Erëmirë Krasniqi: What did you write to each other? What did you write to each other?
Blerim Luzha: I have all the letters, I kept them. You do follow figurative arts? Listen because this might interest you too [addresses the interviewer]. And I wrote to him, “I heard you are very popular, I’m a student studying art. I’m from Pristina.” I told him everything. And he answered, he answered after two weeks or so. He answered in a way that I thought he didn’t even finish elementary school, he didn’t even speak proper Albanian, he could not write and the letters were like doodles, you know I thought so that’s how artists write. And now I had a dilemma of if I should write back or not, he was not worthy (laughs). The mind of a young man! I said I’ll answer out of courtesy. When I answered, within five, six days he sent me a package with exhibition catalogues. Catalogues that showed that he had exhibited with Picasso, with Matisse, then I realized who he was.
So, we had, we corresponded regularly until, until… for about 30 years. But, then Kodra got old, he got old, senile. He came here, because they asked, I had asked Kodra, let me tell you this detail since it is about Kodra, because Kodra is great. I asked him, among other conversations, I asked, “Are you married?” “No.” “Do you want to get married?” He said, “Why are you asking?” I said, “I have a father who likes to set up people” and I said, “two men came from Australia, he found wives for them in Pristina.” “Oh,” he said, “ I’m very, very interested.” “Yes,” I said, “how do you want her?” He said, “I want her to be 18 years old, to speak three, four languages, one that can type on a typewriter, presentable, be like this…” [My father] said to him, “Mister Kodra, you clearly don’t want to get married. Where can you find an 18—year—old Albanian that can speak three, four languages?” He got agitated, his facial expression changed, he was being a little absurd. Anyways this is a digression. When I came back from Paris, Kodra after seven years came here for an exhibition in ‘67.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: How was Paris for you since it was your first trip?
Blerim Luzha: Me? No, no we will stick with Kodra for a bit more. When he saw me from afar he waved his hand {explains with hands}, he said, “Eh, Blerim you were right, I still did not marry.” (laughs) I don’t know if I can say this or not, but since it is about a great person, why not?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Why not.
Blerim Luzha: And, how was Paris for me?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: I mean what did you do, since it was your first trip out of Yugoslavia?
Blerim Luzha: Now, I’ll tell you, because it was very hard in the beginning because I didn’t speak French, because I learned English for the Japan scholarship. I could communicate and I had passed the exam at the Institute of Languages and Phonetics in Belgrade. When I went there, French people did not speak foreign languages, rare were those who spoke English. And like this, mostly with hands and stuff.
Eh, in the beginning I went as a guest of my father’s friend, I stayed there for a month and a half as a guest. And then with their help, they found me a job, the job was in a meat canning factory. I washed some cauldrons for five months until I started speaking a bit of French. And then, I couldn’t find a job in my profession because I didn’t know where to look, there were no [textile] factories and stuff.
Then I met an Albanian woman from Përmet who was, who was like a minority, her father was Greek, her mother Albanian. She worked, she was old, she was about 60 years old, she worked in a few houses, she would clean for a week, a day, a, a day in one house… and I told her my situation, she worked in a house in which the owner worked in Orly Airport. And he invited me, there was an open position to go there to apply, because you know I told him which languages I speak, Albanian, Serbian, Turkish, these were languages that nobody spoke there.
And I acce… I almost passed the exam, went to the interview, but when they asked me, “Do you have a driving license?” I said, “No.” And they turned me down. But, then she continued to look for a job to accommodate me and she found, I mean she found fashion and textile design houses. They are 21, there are 21 in Paris. And I applied to all of them, one after the other, one after the other, I was turned down everywhere. Two of them that were better known, I thought I would never get it. I tried there, I went, and they accepted me. That fashion house was called Dessens Opera, there at… have you been to Paris?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Yes, yes!
Blerim Luzha: Eh, at the Opera Square, because of the Opera it was called Dessens Opera. And I got in as an intern for a week. And I was accepted, after a week I was accepted, because on my third day, two of my works were bought by an Argentine. However, that was a secret, they didn’t tell you. While we worked for that company, for the studio and they… we were 21, so 21 designers. And they [our designs] were owned by the company Dessens Opera, so we were anonymous.
There was a beautiful girl there, she was there as an office administrator and she knew, she knew English. And one day she was waiting for me at the door, after three—four days, she said, “Look, I want to congratulate you because two of your works were sold. But if anyone find outs, I will get fired.” I said, “I’m an Albanian, I won’t tell.” And I got accepted, when I got accepted after a week then I had a contract for three months. After three months they gave me a longer contract, I worked there, I had a good time.
Erëmirë Krasniqi: So you did designs for them?
Blerim Luzha: Textile design. I worked there and it was a very good mix of Parisians. There were no… there was one from Brazil, a girl whose name was Josefina, we worked, only the two of us were foreigners and we were well accepted. The French are quite intolerant socially, but when they accept you into their circle of friends, they don’t differentiate from their own… from the French. So, every birthday, every holiday they invited me and I had a good time. Are you interested in any of my experiences, any personal experience and… ?
Erëmirë Krasniqi: Yes, yes if you have any interesting stories?
Blerim Luzha: It is a very interesting story, I mean I had a good time. I had four friends from Kosovo there, Albanians, and as a young man I was nostalgic to speak Albanian, so we met every Saturday, Sunday. And one day with a friend, we talked about, going, going to a street called Saint Germain des Prés and going to a ballroom there. He did not come, he did not come to the meeting and to tell you the truth I was a little mad because he was always punctual, very rarely him or me would be a few minutes late. I waited, I waited, I waited, he did not come.
I saw people going up the stairs [at a place] with music, I thought I should go in, just like that. I got in there, there were Japanese people, Japanese music and they got out and waited for me, they grabbed me by the hand, they sat me somewhere. I didn’t know what was happening, food, and sandwiches, cakes, drinks, Japanese girls came, they wore kimonos. I danced, unaware, when it was 12 o’clock the bride came, it was a private wedding (laughs).
There were two parties, the groom’s family, and the bride’s family. Eh, his family thought I was a guest of her family, her family thought I was a guest of his (laughs). I had a, a great night, many pictures were taken, I did many things, but that’s just that. I don’t have any souvenirs because I didn’t know anybody and I never saw any of them again. This was the best night in Paris (laughs).
[1] Shkolla e Mesme e Artit në Pejë, Art High School in Peja, was built in 1926 and opened in 1949. It was here that the first generations of visual artists in Kosovo received their education in figurative and applicative arts. The education they received enabled the artists to continue on to higher education in the arts. The historical building of the Art High School in Peja was destroyed in August, 2017.
[2]Shemsedin Kasapolli (1929-2006) was born in Peja, Kosovo. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Belgrade, Serbia. Upon his return to Kosovo in 1969 he taught aesthetics at the Shkolla e Lartë Pedagogjike and later at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prishtina.
[3] Svetozar Kamenović (1921–1979) was born in Pirot, Serbia. He was a Kosovo Serb painter who finished his training at the Belgrade Academy of Fine Arts in 1953. After graduating, he began teaching at the Arts School in Peja, where he remained until his death in 1979. His paintings were widely exhibited in Kosovo, in particular in the 1970s.
[4] Vladimir Vlada Radović (1901-1986) was born in Peja, Kosovo. He graduated from the School of Arts in Belgrade, Serbia. He was one of the first educated painters in Kosovo and an organizer of cultural life in Peja, as well as a teacher at the Art High School in Peja.
[5] Fis is the Albanian exogamous kinship group that like the Latin gens includes individuals who share an ancestor. Fis can be defined as a patrilineal descent group and an exogamous unit whose members used to own some common property. Membership in a fis is based on a common mythical male ancestor.
[6] Shkolla e Lartë Pedagogjike, The High Pedagogical School, was founded in Pristina in 1958 as the first institution of higher education in Kosovo. In 1974, the academic staff of the Figurative Arts department of the High Pedagogical School founded the Academy of Fine Arts within the newly established University of Pristina.
[7] Rilindja, the first Albanian-language newspaper in Yugoslavia, initially printed in 1945 as a weekly newspaper.
[8] Turkish: çilim, known as kilim, is a flat tapestry- a woven carpet or rug traditionally produced in countries within the former Ottoman Empire.
[9] Koča Popović (1908–1992) was born in Belgrade, Serbia. He studied law and philosophy in Paris. Popović served as the Chief of the General Staff of the Yugoslav People’s Army. He was the foreign minister of Yugoslavia, and spent the final years of his political career as the Vice President of Yugoslavia.
[10] Emin Duraku (1918-1942) was a Yugoslavian partisan active during the Second World War, and a national hero. Duraku was born in Gjakova in 1918. He was an early Albanian member of the Yugoslav communist movement.
[11] State Security Administration in Yugoslavia, known as Uprava državne bezbednosti [UDB].
[12] Ibrahim Likmetaj Kodra (1918 – 2006) was born in Ishëm, Albania. He was an Albanian modernist painter. He lived and worked in Milan, Italy.
[13] Lin Delija (1926 – 1994) was born in Shkodër, Albania. He was an Albanian-Italian painter.
