Lahore-based Naazish Ata-ullah finds positivity in satire of new gen
Hyderabad, Jan 12: Far from an oppressive air that pervaded Pakistan’s artistic community till a quarter century ago, its present cultural scene brims with talent who have humour and the freedom to use it all effectively, according to a leading artist-curator and human rights activist from that Islamic Republican country.
Repeated attacks on art that Pakistan suffered under dictatorial president Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq who died in 1988 contrasts positively with that nation’s current scene defined by a rise in the number of galleries and reputation of its visual artists in the international market, Lahore-based Naazish Ata-Ullah noted here.
What’s more, women — once extremely repressed — are a marked presence in the contemporary art circuits of Pakistan, she said in a lecture organised in the city on Sunday evening as part of the Krishnakriti Annual Festival of Art and Culture.
In her talk titled ‘Guns and Roses: Contemporary Art in Pakistan’, Prof Ata-ullah, who is also an art educator and writer, recalled at the start the amount of censorship and assault that art faced at its “worst” in her country in the 1980s. By the early 1990s, the situation altered encouragingly for the artists, who have today gained immense reputation around the globe.
“Today, Pakistan doesn’t face any degree of censorship on art,” pointed the 64-year-old speaker, who undertook her post-graduate studies in printmaking at the Slade School of Fine Art in London and in art education at the Institute of Education, London University. “All works of art are getting accommodated in our galleries.”
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| Lahore-based scholar Naazhish Ata-ullah speaks on contemporary art in Pakistan at the Krishnakriti Annual Festival of Art & Culture at Hyderabad on its concluding day of January 11 |
Her talk at L V Prasad Eye Institute on the last day of the Krishnakriti festival was preceded by a presentation by Rajasthani artist Chintan Upadhyay, who is the founder of Sandarbh, a not-for-profit organization that functions in rural areas.
Prof Ata-ullah, while listing out select artists of eminence in her country’s recent history, showed a 2008 painting by mid-career artist Ali Raza. With lavish use of blue colour, ‘Making of Guns’ would at one glance mislead the viewer that the children portrayed are “doing something like embroidery when they are actually a link in the production of guns”.
Ayesha Jatoi’s installation ‘Clothesline’ in 2006 is a clever work where the Islamabad-based artist swiftly hangs red-dyed clothes all over an unused bomber aircraft placed in a crossroads of her city. “By when the army personnel put a stop to it, she had documented the act,” pointed out the speaker, who was the Head of Printmaking in the Department of Fine Art at the National College of Arts, Lahore.
Sana Arjumand’s work showing the a cloth designed on the lines of Pakistan’s national flag draped over a car and Faiza Butt’s ‘Placebos for my Warriors’ that prominently shows a one-eyed person looking suspiciously similar to Taliban supreme commander Mullah Omar also made it to Prof Ata-ullah’s line-up.
Ali Kazim’s 2006 work titled Topi Wala shows the face of a bare-chested and bearded man wearing a skullcap, his eyes closed — lending it an intriguing expression.
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| Rajasthani artist Chintan Upadhyay speaks on his works and collective called Sandarbh at the Krishnakriti Annual Festival of Art & Culture at Hyderabad on its concluding day of January 11. |
A video art by young artists Rabbiya Nasser and Hurmait ul Ain shows two Pakistani girls uttering stereotyped sentences while moving their heads up and down in tandem. Then there are the armour skirts moulded by Naiza Khan who does not live in her native Pakistan these days.
Images of Lahore resident Risham Syed’s ‘Quilt’ series of 2012 and Imran Mudassar’s untitled series of 2008 besides Farida Batool’s image of a girl skipping in front of a burned building and master miniaturist Imran Quereshi’s work at Sharjah Biennial also came up in the power-point presentation, which concluded with a 2014 video by Haider Ali Jan.
The day also saw the opening of three exhibitions — all by French artist B2Fays who uses new technologies and traditional art. ‘Nomads of Memories’ (paintings) at Kalakriti gallery and an interactive media installation at Alliance Francaise will end on January 21, while a show at Goethe Zentrum will conclude on January 19.
On Sunday forenoon, Annapurna International School of Film & Media hosted a filmmaking workshop as part of the 11th edition of the Krishnakriti festival. Institute president Chris Higgins gave class on story scripting to 20-odd delegates from across ages and regions.
In the evening, it screened a film on Hyderabad’s Dakhani stream of soiree literature. Gautam Pemmaraju, who is the director of the 120-minute documentary ‘A Tongue Untied’, interacted with the audience.
The five-day festival, conceived by Krishnakriti Foundation, featured top-notch dance, music, cinema and painting alongside talks, seminars and workshops. It simultaneously conducted a major art camp simultaneously, the proceeds of which would go for charity, foundationhead Prshant Lahoti said.
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