Today’s post contains selections from the November 1965 issue of Nëndori, which features Ramiz Alia’s report delivered at the 15th general Plenum of the Central Committee of the Albanian Workers Party. Given on the eve of the most intense period of Hoxha’s cultural ‘revolutionization,’ which extended from 1966 till 1969 or so, Alia’s report clearly lays out guidelines (though of course the instructions for their actual realization are left vague) for the coming transformation of the arts and letters in relation to the masses.
Among other issues, he stresses the importance of the cultivation of aesthetic taste, since the everyday totalized experience of the socialist state is fundamentally an aesthetic one. As Alia explains,
The problem of conceptual-aesthetic [ideoestetik] education is not merely a problem for a few specific organizations, but rather for our entire society. In fact, people, throughout their entire lives, constantly encounter problems that relate to their education in understanding the beautiful—from their families and work environments to art institutions, from the construction of villages and cities to the creation of handicrafts in wood and knitting. […] Wherever we go, we encounter buildings, parks, flower gardens, monuments, and even the arrangements in store windows—all of these have no choice but to influence the aesthetic education of our fellow citizens. (42)
The issue also contains some reproductions of artworks and brief notes about cultural events, including a short report on an exhibition of graphic art, caricature, and poster design that travelled to socialist Albania from the People’s Republic of China.
Happy Reading!
afterart 