What a journey this painter has made! Paulin Nikoli began to express his art in old Nice. It was 2009, and the people of Nice were accustomed to seeing his paintings displayed on the sidewalk in front of his studio, in a street of this old town climbing toward the Castle Hill.
We also remember the hassles caused by the authorities for this artist. Then Paulin changed address, still staying in this Babazouk, he continued working and expressing his art. We knew him at his beginnings, painting on his canvases, exhibiting them and persevering, convinced he was right and determined to succeed. True artists often struggled, and it was their perseverance that sparked their fame.
Paulin Nikoli came to Nice from the land of eagles, Albania; he has been in France for 16 years. Now married to Tatiana, his Russian wife gave him a son, Victor, aged 19 months. Paulin is a lover of life, an eternal optimist. “My life is a carnival,” he tells us, but be careful, take his definition in the positive sense of the word. He also specifies: “
I am fortunate to live by the sea; life is a joy, the sun of my existence.”
The Ferrero gallery opens its space and its walls to him. Regulars may be surprised at first, for Paulin is not, or at least was not, an insider artist. Fifteen paintings plus a performance carried out the day of the opening are on display to the public in the gallery.
Paulin Nikoli has chosen two periods of his work, two themes of which the connection is the love of life, the love of colors, optimism; a beautiful lesson of wisdom for the eternally unsatisfied. Paulin offers us pages of light and hope.
His work is a message of peace, love, and wisdom. He stands before us, truly an artist, bohemian, and there lies his charm, with his blond cherub of a little boy in his arms. What a journey accomplished, as we said at the beginning of this article, Paulin Nikoli will be among the most famous artists tomorrow because he has his own mark, his style, and his way of painting. Life and the joy of living are his canons.
Paulin Nikoli will be among the greatest, the most famous. It is to be hoped then that our city leaders will know how to make people forget the troubles this artist has endured. Paulin did not exchange a canvas for a hot meal, as in Charles Aznavour’s La Bohème; he exhibited his oils, bringing color and life to Old Nice.
Paulin Nikoli, an exhibition at the Ferrero gallery not to be missed. An event in the cultural microcosm of Nice.
Thierry Jan
