Artist Residencies
Vila 31 x Art Explora, Tirana
Applications for the 2027 programme are open until May 1.
The Tirana - Vila 31 x Art Explora residency programme will welcome up to thirty artists and researchers for 3-month residencies spread over 3 sessions per year. Each resident will benefit from a studio apartment, production and exhibition spaces, as well as a living and production grant to develop his or her research. Particular attention will be paid to artists and researchers based in the Balkans, while welcoming international artists.
Located in Vila 31, the former home of dictator Enver Hoxha, the Tirana - Vila 31 x Art Explora artists' residence aims to extend the local dynamic of public reappropriation of this historic site. The NeM architectural firm was chosen to renovate Vila 31, with the aim of balancing the need to preserve the site and its history with the need to create neutral spaces in which to rewrite new, plural histories.
Terms and conditions
Applications for 2027 are open from April 2 to May 1, 2026, for the three residency sessions, with the option to apply for three different types of residency programs:
SOLO
programme
Artists COLLECTIVE
programme
or a researcher/scientist/curator.
Programme
CROSS
Seminars and festivals
In order to encourage dialogue and mobility among artists between the cultural scenes of the Balkans and the European Union, Art Explora has partnered with the National School of Arts of Paris-Cergy (ENSAPC), the Museum of Contemporary Art in Skopje (MoCA), and the Oral History Initiative (OHI) - Pristina, to organize, over a period of three years (2023 to 2025), a series of transdisciplinary seminars and performance festivals in Paris, Skopje, Pristina, and Tirana.
The first edition of this transdisciplinary seminar, entitled "Réveil sur Mars" (Awakening on Mars), was held on June 30 and July 1, 2023, at the Gaîté Lyrique in Paris. On May 24 and 25, 2024, Pristina hosted the second edition of this transdisciplinary seminar organized by the Oral History Initiative (OHI), focusing on the potential of oral and written archives as political tools. These events were followed by the Skopje Performance Festival, which took place from 4 to 6 October 2024. Vila 31 hosted the third edition of the transdisciplinary seminar in Tirana from 9 to 13 April 2025, bringing together art exhibitions, concerts, performances, screenings, workshops and a symposium. A few months later, from 21 November to 1 December 2025, La Vila 31 opened its doors once again to host a performance festival showcasing artists in residence and other guests from the contemporary scene, including dancer Orion's Belt. Participants gathered for performances, screenings, concerts and workshops.
Project co-funded by the European Union
The calendar
Applications close: May 1, 2026
The selection committee
Head Curator in the Contemporary Creation and Prospective Department of the Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre Pompidou, Paris
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Alicia Knock has been a curator in the Contemporary Creation and Prospective Department at Centre Pompidou since 2015.
Her work focuses on modern and contemporary art from Africa and Central Europe, with a particular emphasis on acquisitions and exhibitions. In 2018, she created the "Cercle international Afrique" of the Friends of the Centre Pompidou. She seeks to propose innovative, creative and forward-looking exhibition formats that question the museum of tomorrow from a decolonial perspective. Her work is also committed to giving greater visibility to women artists. She has been commissioned to curate the Albanian pavilion at the 2019 Venice Biennale. She has worked with numerous art institutions, including the Palais de Tokyo in Paris and MoMA PS1 in New York.
Director of the National Gallery of Arts, Albania; founder of Tirana Art Lab – Center for Contemporary Art; curator and author
Learn moreAdela Demetja born in Tirana is an Albanian-German curator, cultural manager, art producer, author, and institutional leader, based between Tirana and Frankfurt am Main, and active across Albania, Western Europe, and Southeast Europe.
Since September 2025, she has served as Director of the National Gallery of Arts of Albania, appointed through an open call. She is the first woman director in the 72-year history of the institution. Previously, Demetja was the founding director of Tirana Art Lab – Center for Contemporary Art (2010–2025), one of Albania’s leading contemporary art institutions, as well as the founding director of the Albanian Visual Arts Network (AVAN) and Tirana Art Weekend, initiatives that have significantly strengthened the country’s independent art ecosystem and international visibility. She curated the Albanian Pavilion at 59th Venice Biennale represented by Lumturi Blloshmi. She is founder and program director of “Curating with Care” alternative educational program in curating taking place in Tirana.
She holds a master in "Curatorial and Critical Studies" of Städelschule and Goethe University, Frankfurt/Main. As an independent curator she has curated numerous international exhibitions and collaborated among others with institutions like National Gallery of Arts Tirana, National Art Gallery of Kosovo, Maxim Gorki Theatre Berlin, Portland Institute for Contemporary Art USA, Project Biennale D-0 Ark Underground Konjic, Action Field Kodra Thessaloniki, Lothringer 13 Kunsthalle Munich, Villa Romana Florence, Haus am Lützowplatz Berlin.
Director of S AM Swiss Architecture Museum, Basel; Curator at the Büro für geistige Mitarbeit at the Kunsthaus Zürich; author and editor
Learn moreAdam Szymczyk (b. 1970, Piotrków Trybunalski, Poland) is a curator, author and editor based in Zurich, Switzerland. He is Director of the Swiss Architecture Museum (S AM) in Basel and Curator at the Büro für geistige Mitarbeit at the Kunsthaus Zürich.
He was Director and Chief Curator of Kunsthalle Basel between 2003 and 2014 and Artistic Director of documenta 14 in Athens and Kassel between 2014 and 2017. In 2022, he founded the Verein by Association, a non-profit association for contemporary art and culture in Zurich.
Recent exhibitions projects include Tirana Patience (co-curated with Nataša Ilić) at the National Gallery of Arts, Tirana (2020), Yannis Tsarouchis: Dancing in Real Life at Wrightwood 659, Chicago IL (2021), Other Voices, Other Rooms at Criminal Investigation Department of Zurich Municipal Police (2021), Life, Without Buildings at gta Exhibitions, Zurich (2022), Ahlam Shibli: Dissonant Belonging (co-curated with Vassilis Oikonomopoulos) at LUMA Arles (2023), Wilhelm Sasnal: Painting as Prop at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (2024), and What Is Real?, the Art Focus exhibition of Art Week Tokyo, at the Okura Museum of Art in Tokyo (2025).
Deputy Director and Head of Exhibitions and Programmes, Art Jameel; Co-Artistic Director, Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale 2026
Learn moreNora is Deputy Director and Head of Exhibitions and Programmes at Art Jameel, where she oversees the exhibitions programme across both Jameel Arts Centre in Dubai and Hayy Jameel in Jeddah – leading a team of curators, producers and designers to deliver an ambitious programme of commissions, 12 exhibitions a year, large-scale public artworks, publications as well as public programmes. She is currently the Co-Artistic Director for the 2026 edition of the Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale, running till May 2, 2026. Previous roles include Head of Programmes and Exhibitions at the Sursock Museum and Curator of Public Programmes at Tate.
Head of Research & Emergence at Hartwig Art Foundation, Amsterdam; Curator of the 6th Autostrada Biennale; programmer and strategist
Learn moreLucia Pietroiusti (based between London and the Netherlands) stewards research and experimentation at the intersection of art, ecology and systems. She is Head of Research & Emergence at Hartwig Museum, Amsterdam, opening in 2028. She will be the Curator of the 6th Autostrada Biennale (Prizren, Kosovo) in 2027. Until 2025, Pietroiusti was Head of Ecologies at Serpentine, London, where she founded the General Ecology project (2018-2025). Recent publications include The Shape of a Circle in the Mind of a Fish (2025, with Filipa Ramos) and More-than-Human (ed. with Andrés Jaque and Marina Otero Verzier, 2020). Pietroiusti was the curator of the Golden-Lion winning opera-performance, Sun & Sea by Rugile Barzdžiukaitė, Vaiva Grainytė and Lina Lapelytė (58th Venice Biennale and 2019-2025 tour); as well as Songs for the Changing Seasons, 1st Vienna Klima Biennale (2024) and Persones Persons, 8th Biennale Gherdeïna (2022, both with Filipa Ramos); and Bodies of Water, 13th Shanghai Biennale (2020-2021, with Andrés Jaque, Marina Otero Verzier, Filipa Ramos and You Mi). Pietroiusti is Chair of the Board of Trustees of Forma, London and serves on the board of the Gallery Climate Coalition.
Curator and Head of the Department of Modern and Contemporary Latin American Art, Denver Art Museum; researcher and writer
Learn moreRaphael Fonseca is Curator and head of the department of Modern and Contemporary Latin American Art at the Denver Art Museum. He is a researcher interested in the intersections of art history, fiction, resilience, pleasure, and education, always through a transgeographical perspective. A Brazilian-born curator and writer, he is the curator of the Taiwan Pavilion at the 2026 Venice Biennal and part of the curatorial ensemble of the Counterpublic Triennial 2026, in St. Louis. He is also one of the curators of the 2027 edition of Sequences, a visual arts biennial happening in Reykjavik, Iceland. He served as the chief curator of the 14th Mercosur Biennial, held in Porto Alegre, Brazil, in 2025, and as one of the co-curators of the 22nd SESC_Videobrasil Biennial, held at SESC 24 de Maio in São Paulo, Brazil, in 2023. He holds a PhD in Art History and Criticism at the State University of Rio de Janeiro.
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