by Carolin Kralapp // Sept. 30, 2025
How to deal with war, pain, loss and displacement? The Hamburger Bahnhof is currently showing a deeply personal response to these questions. In his solo exhibition ‘An Opera Out of Time,’ Berlin-based, Kosovar artist Petrit Halilaj transposes his first opera ‘Syrigana’ from the stage into the exhibition space. Drawing on a life marked by war and cultural oppression, he creates a walk-in dreamscape full of hope, calling for unity in diversity and a return to community. Blending reality and fiction, fantastical elements and animal figures, Halilaj builds a safe space for all those perceived as “other”—everyone is invited to step in.
Petrit Halilaj: ‘An Opera Out of Time,’ 2025-26, installation view at Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart // © Petrit Halilaj, 2025 / mennour, Paris, ChertLüdde, Berlin and kurimanzutto, New York and Mexico City, photo by Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Nationalgalerie / Jacopo La Forgia
The exhibition opens with a series of large moth sculptures, a recurring motif in the artist’s work since 2016. The first was made together with his mother, Shkurte Halilaj, who plays a key role in his artistic practice. Using traditional textiles from Kosovo and the Balkans, he turns moths into monumental figures, some of which are full-body costumes that the artist inhabits. Halilaj often slips into animal roles when words fail him, as he explained in a talk with curator Catherine Nichols during the Berlin Art Week tour of his exhibition. At the opening, he appeared on stage in a bird costume. Growing up as a queer person in a conservative country, adopting different roles also had a more serious side for Halilaj: for a long time, he was unable to express or live his true identity. Although queerness is more widely accepted in Kosovo today, the instinct to disguise oneself remains.
Petrit Halilaj: ‘An Opera Out of Time,’ 2025-26, installation view at Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart // © Petrit Halilaj, 2025 / mennour, Paris, ChertLüdde, Berlin and kurimanzutto, New York and Mexico City, photo by Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Nationalgalerie / Jacopo La Forgia
Moving past moths and gnarled branches, we enter the theater installation ‘Shkrepëtima,’ which incorporates stage elements and props from the play of the same name. Premiered in 2018 in Halilaj’s hometown of Runik, Kosovo, it explores the lost “houses of culture” once common in Yugoslavia, before its dissolution in 1991. Runik’s own was destroyed twice: first under the Serbian nationalist regime and again during the Kosovo War of the late 1990s. Bricks and tiles from the former building are incorporated into the installation. Thanks to Halilaj’s initiative, the cultural center is being rebuilt to once again enable communal dreaming. The play tells of a sleeping boy, half human, half bird, who dreams of reviving the ruins. Rubble, optimism and reveries are recurrent themes throughout the exhibition.
Petrit Halilaj: ‘An Opera Out of Time,’ 2025-26, installation view at Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart // © Petrit Halilaj, 2025 / mennour, Paris, ChertLüdde, Berlin und kurimanzutto, New York and Mexico City, photo by Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Nationalgalerie / Jacopo La Forgia
At its heart is Halilaj’s debut opera ‘Syrigana,’ an epic five-act love story. Premiered in June 2025, the opera now unfolds spatially in Berlin, with floating figures and surreal scenography. Named after the village where his mother grew up, near the Serbian border, Syrigana also provides the setting. Visitors first enter a garden with flowers and pear trees created by Halilaj and his life partner Álvaro Urbano. The story draws from a Kosovar legend in which Adam and Eve, expelled from Eden, arrive in Syrigana. Here they are depicted as a fox and a rooster, watching events unfold from atop a high window ledge. Instead of an empty land, they encounter villagers eager to marry them off as a welcome gesture. Their love crosses species and identity boundaries—Halilaj stages an “impossible” love here. References to home are present once again: the biblical apple tree is replaced by the pear tree, which is widespread in Kosovo, and a rooster is added to the scene. As the artist emphasizes in conversation, chickens and roosters remind him of home—they are an integral part of the community.
Petrit Halilaj: ‘An Opera Out of Time,’ 2025-26, installation view at Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart // © Petrit Halilaj, 2025 / mennour, Paris, ChertLüdde, Berlin und kurimanzutto, New York and Mexico City, photo by Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Nationalgalerie / Jacopo La Forgia
The exhibition closes with a more haunting scene. In the middle of a pink lake stands a ghostly horse, the air heavy with the smell of synthetic detergent. Draped across its mouth is a shoka—a traditional belt, which lends its name to the work. Halilaj’s great-great-grandfather, Baba Gan, who was said to have ridden a white horse, was murdered in 1912 during the Serbian invasion of Kosovo for his role in the Albanian resistance. This powerful piece speaks of the realities of ethnic cleansing—a pertinent warning sign before leaving the show.
Petrit Halilaj: ‘An Opera Out of Time,’ 2025-26, installation view at Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart // © Petrit Halilaj, 2025 / mennour, Paris, ChertLüdde, Berlin und kurimanzutto, New York and Mexico City, photo by Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Nationalgalerie / Jacopo La Forgia
In ‘An Opera Out of Time,’ Halilaj builds a layered visual language that lingers with us. The exhibition navigates the uncanny space between reality and fiction, where real places and memories merge with fantasy, dissolving boundaries. The result is not a burden of personal trauma but a vision of radical openness and acceptance. What first feels strange or unfamiliar quickly takes on magical and playful qualities with closer inspection. With this show, Halilaj creates a boundless space for dreaming and togetherness—an overarching vision that, considering the present global political moment, cannot be emphasized enough.
Exhibition Info
Hamburger Bahnhof
Petrit Halilaj : ‘An Opera Out Of Time’
Exhibition: Sept. 11, 2025-May 31, 2026
smb.museum
Invalidenstraße 50, 10557 Berlin, click here for map
