Review: Aasim Akhtar

Hazy dreams

Aasim Akhtar's recent drawings at Rohtas II were like characters in a finely woven plot where each individual is signifying the other and carrying multiple themes along the way to the final act

By Naeem Safi

But solemn is the silence

on the silvery haze

That drinks away their

voices in echoless repose,

And dreamily the evening has

stilled the haunted braes,

And dreamier the

gloaming grows.

The stanza from The Fairy Thorn by Samuel Ferguson best describes the overall mood of Aasim Akthar's "And dreamier, the gloaming grows", which is a series of his recent drawings that went on display at Rohtas II, in Lahore. The series uses the minimalist choice of materials -- 15 drawings framed in white, graphite on paper, with a couple of pastel works, and hung on white walls.

At first glance, some of the works look like a continuation of Marvin Bileck's etchings and engravings; not just for the choice of the title of the show but also for the choice of forms used, like the ones in the Heart to Heart, with which the show begins. However, it goes beyond that where the narrative begins with a metaphor from nature, and then goes on to engage metaphors of the nature. The varying tones of grey, and the choice of intimate instances -- personal, telluric, or the marriage of both -- is divulging the subconscious. It is nature that creates attraction between the two opposites and connects the organic forms of existence, or even the inorganic ones. The show is like a journey through the colourless mist of melancholy, where the images seem like reflections from a very lonely place. The place where subtle is part of the obvious, and obscure is rendering clarity.

Most of these drawings are like whispers, almost motionless, and embedded within them are the fine suggestions of the ineffable; while some are meandering through the moonlit landscapes of carnal desires, from a perspective that is slightly drifting towards the Other side, away from the land-of-the-sane-and-the-sure. A place where tall peaks of human passion are laden with tales that need to be told, and the walls of deep gorges are painted with shades of concupiscence. The interplays between the positives and the negatives, and the animate and the inanimate -- especially in the case of the five Bodyscapes -- are giving birth to the new and the more meaningful.

The Wind of Desire beautifully portrays the classic contest between the pull of desire and the vast abyss that is filled with myriad obstructions impeding the former. Along with that, the desire to break free from it, and glide over this chasm towards the ultimate bliss, intensifies this contest. The distorted torso with the bloated chest seems to be filled with the immense burden and pain that is precipitated by this conflict, as if desire is a deity and human flesh its ambrosias, struggling for survival yet defenceless and being sacrificed for a 'sacred' and inevitable cause of making the desire immortal.

In the Poppy Seed, poppy buds, flowers, and stems are rendered and composed in a manner in which they are dancing to the tune of life, depicting the never ending attraction between the pollen and the carpel, present in almost all living beings, in one form or the other, and a major thesis of life itself. The pale coloured petals of the blossoming flowers are the only objects that have used some hues in the entire body of works displayed in the show. Such a limited and careful application of colour, in this context, is apparently suggesting, or desiring, the feminine as a source for brining the colourfulness into the grand scheme of existence.

Apart from the individuality of each work, the discourse created by the titles in a particular order, and parallel to that the catharsis produced by the visuals in that order, further add on other meaningful layers to the set in totality; like characters in a finely woven plot where each individual is signifying the other while at the same time asserting its own identity, and carrying multiple themes along the way to the final act.

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Published in The News on Sunday

http://jang.com.pk/thenews/may2010-weekly/nos-23-05-2010/enc.htm#2

Interview: Amira Farooq

"The best part is the absolute isolation"

By Naeem Safi

Amira Farooq lives and works in Lahore. She received her BFA from NCA in 2004, followed by a brief adventure in print and electronic media as a model and presenter. Since then she has been painting and recently had her first solo exhibition at Nairang Art Gallery. She creates intense dialogues concerning the complementary nature of human relationships, emotions, and the existence, by juxtaposing the opposites in contrasting colours and forms -- usually, along with some elements from nature.

She is the fifth person to go to NCA from her family, and that too only to pursue fine arts. "Father is an architect, and mother is a designer. It definitely had an influence on me, because you see the way your house is kept; every little thing, like how to view things."

TNS: How has your major in printmaking at NCA influenced your work?

AF: It's all connected. I need variations in expressions, because you learn things that you might use in the other medium. Printmaking is a two-dimensional medium and I think that comes out a lot in my work. But the more I paint, the more I break away from that.

TNS: How has NCA affected your work, if at all?

AF: NCA, obviously, is an old structure, and has taught me some discipline that you can't work without. But apart from that, it is the exposure that I got there, by meeting people from all over Pakistan, which was a huge eye-opener and got me out of my own little bubble. It has influenced my work more, conceptually, rather than in technique or skill.

TNS: How do you conceptualise your images? Do you draw on ideas or memories?

AF: I just pick an emotion, focus on it and I paint the visuals that best describe it. Sometimes I sketch, but most of the times I am working straight on canvas. I have to have music to work; that really helps channelling the emotions and in focusing.

TNS: How much role the element of chance has in your work?

AF: I think everything that we do in life is half chance. When you start making a painting, you intend to do one thing, but during the process you discover things, maybe through the paint, or let's say something spills over, or all of a sudden you see something on the canvas that you hadn't intended to make before. So yes, there is the element of chance in almost all creative processes.

TNS: What famous artists have influenced you, and how?

AF: Michelangelo has influenced me for one sheer skill, prolificacy. And then Dali for his mind; you just can't walk away from Dali without reacting. I really love Van Gough because he was the rebel of the art world. I, kind of, relate to him in terms of feeling misunderstood. In order to achieve greatness, there is a certain amount of suffering involved, and nobody gets it better than Van Gough. And then when I'm sitting down and painting, in my space, my biggest influence would probably be the first cave painter. Because here was somebody who was free of conditioning and approval, and all he thought about was just making an image, and re-creating something that he had seen in nature. And I think you have to be really free in your head from the voices of other people while you paint. So, I channel that anonymous caveman -- or woman, we don't know -- who started painting on the cave walls.

TNS: You mean you paint without any inhibition and do not expect any sort of appreciation for your work?

AF: When I am painting, the viewers are not there. They come into the picture when I show them my work. There is a dialogue. Not every piece can be loved by everyone; but every piece is loved by someone. That is a sort of validation that you need, to keep working. Because there is so much isolation in this profession that without that feedback, sometimes, it's hard to see what you are doing is really important. The job description of the artist is to be the conscience of the nation. In order to love something, you have to be free of your own selfish desires.

TNS: Do you feel that your technique of rendering is a bit simplified for painting?

AF: One could look at my work and say that it's not as 'skilled' as it is expected to be, but that is exactly my point. I'm trying to create a stylised version of reality that looks very simple from a distance, and even child-like to some extent. But at a second glance, the concept is not child-like at all. The paradox I like to play with my work is to keep the visuals very simple and the concept a little out of the box. Lately I've gone back to the primaries; if it's a simple thought, I might use fewer colours. It depends on what I am trying to say.

TNS: What are the best and the worst parts of being an artist?

AF: The best part is the absolute isolation, and it is just addictive once you start expressing yourself on a daily basis. Being an artist gives me a licence to insanity.

But then, the stereotyping can be very inextricable. Because most of the people believe that I will automatically be liberal and open to everything and anything under the sun, which is not the case. I have very clear-cut preferences and very precise likes and dislikes. And being a female artist, there are a lot of sexist gender issues attached as well.
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Published in The News on Sunday
http://jang.com.pk/thenews/feb2010-weekly/nos-14-02-2010/enc.htm#4

Interview: Saeed Akhtar

"Art is all about our lives, why hide it?"

Professor Saeed Akhtar’s contribution to the development of art in Pakistan can hardly be matched. His is undoubtedly a classic master. His observation, mastery of skill, combined with his imagination has produced the most remarkable works that appreciate the beautiful in the local by idealising them in various thematic settings. Quest for the Divine beauty was the focus of his recent exhibition.

By Naeem Safi

The News on Sunday: Have you always been an artist?

Saeed Akhtar: I had this appetence for art, just like everyone else has that for one thing or the other. However, before that, I was interested in automotive mechanics, especially motorbikes. I would disassemble the parts and join them again, marvelling at their beauty and the capacity of human brain.

TNS: Which aspect of art is more consequential for our times in this part of the world?

SA: Art encompasses all aspects of life through architecture, textiles, ceramics, and other such disciplines. A molvi once said to me that I’ll burn in hell for teaching drawing. I replied that it is for Him to decide, but what can I say about you, the core of ignorance. He works as an electrician, and has learned his trade with a lot of beating from his ustad, instead of learning it in an appropriate institute, where he could have learned proper drawing. The absence of quality art education at school level has turned this society into the mess it is now, where all one see is entangled cables hanging in front of ugly facades. I can not imagine a single moment of life without art.

TNS: Do you believe that this attitude has anything to do with the shifting interest from realism to abstraction?

SA: In our days, art was believed to be a means of earning money, and for that one needed proper training in seven-eight skills to achieve the required level of understanding. These days words are stressed upon more than any other skill; this does not solve the problem. When an artist is not well equipped with the required set of skills it will breed frustration. But who knows, the artists of today can be more successful than those of our times, as each period has its own requisite set of skills. And I believe the young artists are well aware of that.

TNS: As we are talking about changing times, how is Saeed Akhtar of today different from the one of 1960s?

SA: Learning, is what distinguishes them. Our teachers could see one eighth of an inch error in perspective in a glance. I once asked my teacher, "Ustad jee ay inni inni ghaltiyan tohano nazar aa jandian ney?" He said, "Hann puttar, sari umar lang gai ay wekdey." I would not have much consciousness then, regarding my errors; the teachers were there to identify them. Now I can depend only on my own judgement.

My canvas offers me new challenges everyday, it annoys me, it hurts me, and it makes me feel like crying. But the joy that follows a finished work is unthinkable for anyone else. This is what my struggle is all about, since coming from the age that was all about learning the fundamental skills.

TNS: What interests you the most when deciding a subject?

SA: Anything that comes out nicely in the end. Beauty is not the only standard; beyond that, it’s the expression that matters. The thought of painting eyes kept bothering me for a long time; I would paint and wash repeatedly. The eyes that I painted on a 4’x4’ canvas remained untouched for quite a while; one day I started drawing lines around them that turned out to be my own image, from the time spent in Quetta.

TNS: How do you choose your hues and tones, some of them being imaginary for you?

SA: I am not familiar with the look of blush, or a suggestion of greenish tint on some freshly shaven face. But I can not deny their existence. I see tones and then blend them according to my imagination. However, I am not too cautious with colour application; and sometimes my misjudgements fascinate viewers.

TNS: How do you see the nude in the broader scheme of existence?

SA: I believe this whole existence is for the human body. If you pay attention, all the activities that you see around you are linked to the human body, the dress, the building, and almost all of the innovations related to such products. God says that He has created the human body in His own image, which is the most beautiful. In other words, the more beautiful a human, the closest she/he will be to the Divine. God is beautiful and loves beauty. Though we can not imagine His beauty, we can still idealize the glimpse of it in the human form. The Romans and the Greeks have done the same. The seven nuktas that make an alif follow the human proportions with which the whole Quran is written. Sharing beauty and joy is not a sin.

TNS: You believe you are looking for the Divine in such manifestations of beauty?

SA: In this regard, human face attracts me the most. I saw a face, when I went for haj, and thought that the artist who painted Mary must have seen a beauty like this. Such beauty leads to beautiful thoughts where we find our own ideals.

TNS: The figures on display in your recent exhibition portray such beauty?

SA: Beauty is somewhat personal. I like high-bridged noses, some people don’t. Some like narrow eyes, while I like big eyes. You have to see the beauty in its context, because different regions have different perceptions of it. The bright coloured attire and ornaments used in our deserts in the South can not be appreciated through some other culture’s perspective due to the difference in sensibilities. The working women with Gandhi, had just fabric wrapped around their shoulders, and were not wearing any blouses. In our childhood the women would wear tehband with kurtas, and there was no concept of bra. Why do we want to see the female in stiff and straight posture anyway? Similarly, since I have lived in Quetta, I really like the graceful turbans wore by the men there.

In my recent exhibition, only five paintings are a bit exposed, and they were the first to get the sold tag. And the apparently unusual postures are nothing but images from daily life that is not tied with ropes, and which can be extraordinary on its own. One of my paintings — showing a female figure in motion on a swing, her hair swaying in the wind and the bust visible through the drapery — was bought by a lady. I enquired where she had it hung; it was in their living room. Art is all about our lives, why hide it?

TNS: What is the story of buraq?

SA: It is all about emotions and has little to do with the tangible. Our prophet’s journey through heavens — and his description of the ride, which was much faster than light — brings to mind such visuals that guide us to the path of breaking free. Look at the fascinating colours of feathers on this planet; buraq, for me, is the culmination of all flights.

TNS: How do you feel about art appreciation and art criticism in Pakistan?

SA: Artists have colours and art critics have words to play with. But mostly the critics here use the same old vocabulary, and you feel like reading the same thing over and over. Our art institutes mainly focus on the Western Art and art history as the art. And in comparison, there is not much of the published material available on the local arts and artists. Do art students know about the local artists as much as they do about the Western artists? How many art students actively visit art galleries and exhibitions, or know about Shakir Ali Museum, Chughtai Museum, or the Alhamra Permanent Art Gallery?

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Published in The News on Sunday

http://jang.com.pk/thenews/dec2009-weekly/nos-27-12-2009/enc.htm#2

Review: NCA Degree Show 2009

Of Utopias and Dystopias

The degree show of the NCA is undoubtedly one of the biggest annual events of this region, showing some of the best works produced by students coming from myriad backgrounds -- tangible and intangible

By Naeem Safi.

Like the year before, the 2008 Degree Show was held at the main campus of the college and at the relatively new venue, the Old Tollington Market, which originally was the Punjab Exhibition Hall and has been restored to the Heritage Museum a few years back.

In most of Pakistan, a beautiful weather does not necessarily bring smiles on the faces of those who love to walk. The Mall was filled with knee-deep water and the visitors had no choice but to either use their vehicles or wait on either of the venues. It was made worse by the constant power failure, when the spectators could neither go out nor watch the display.The museum space was dedicated to the disciplines of communication design and textile design. A common theme among the communication design works was that very few were up for selling any product, and even those who were, had picked the products with some sense of belonging to the land. One thesis, I'm Not for Sale!, went as far as completely rejecting advertisement and branding, which is a full U-turn for a use of the discipline that was envisioned by Freud's nephew Edward Barnes at the first half of the twentieth century to create artificial need for products that people do not need. Similarly, most of the works were dominated by challenging issues like national identity, environment, rights, and responsibilities. The final output clearly showed a lot of gray matter being utilised behind the fabulous works produced by the young designers and the much improved teaching standard.

The textile section showed some pretty pieces and work but was not offering much that one could muse one's mind with. The attempts of stretching textile design over the domains of something that borders abstract expressionism and pop art, or the literal interpretation of the psychedelic is not likely to help this pragmatic discipline, even on the pretexts like search of the original thought.

Ceramics of Halyma Athar were meant to be seen in motion in a claymation. The fusion of genres in this particular instance was among the best in this degree show. Her eye for details and the colours achieved through glazing creates a beautiful dream landscape. Fahad Alam's fusion is not of the genres but of different glazing -- like raku, resist firing, and different smoke techniques -- with that of calligraphy from the architecture of Aybak's times. The pottery and murals produced in the process are stunning.

The works shown by the students of the department of fine arts (according to their catalogue, 'the art making' department) was as varied as ever, offering some really insightful works along with the usual. As the global village is dominated by fear and misery, the work of the students responded accordingly by depicting wars and suffering. Where their fellow students from architecture department were trying to design structures for utopia, they were showing the disturbing yet true face of the dystopia they are forced to dwell in.Starting from miniature, where needle and scissor was present as always and the scale of the wasli ever expanding, the selection of themes and mediums show a much liberated class of future miniature painters clearly showing some major transformations in the primal practice. Replacing dots with more than ten thousand miniature terracotta bricks, Noor Ali Chagani moves the miniature of Pakistan into a domain yet to be explored and much contested by the traditionalists. Sajjad Hussain's theme of living in war times is a vivid translation of our times. In one instance, where he is showing a soldier in camouflage enjoying his slumber with his boots on a 'flipped' version of Hafiz's poetry, and a Persian gilim -- small rug used by Persian soldiers in the field -- beside him. The flipped verse under the boots is a very powerful metaphor used by Hussain. All boots are made for walking, but some boots are made for walking over everything. The presence of a machine-gun along with a surahi and wine-cups in the same setting shows the intoxicating quality of unprecedented power enjoyed by the war machines in some of the left-over states of the post-colonial times.

Abdul Ghaffar Afridi's sculptures are the most distressing visual experience, where he had put his installations in a closed space where the very light was black. Coming from an area that is now ruled by terror, his choice was obvious to show the Dark Ages his people are going through now: the power of media in forming the popular views over the untold facts, the people's reliance on the news chosen for them by the media, and the sorry state of affairs that is created by this dependence. One can better understand the feelings of the artists coming from the marginalized lands by Nuruddin Farah's (a Somali novelist) remark that, "To starve is to be of media interest these days." Like Ibrahim Ahmed's attempt to protect the innocence against the brutality that is inflicted on the children of his region. Covering books and writing boards with steel and dolls with body armour are very strong and disturbing images. The conviction with what these sculptures are produced is as unsettling, as the artist says to have enjoyed the pain that he had to face through the cuts and bleeding while handling the material with bare hands. Though the overall theme of the show was very gloomy, these instances show the seriousness of the situation around us.

Imran Mudassar showed the body armour in his drawings, Figurative, from a different perspective. His personal experiences, like his campus being barbed-wired to protect the students from the unseen threat, made him question the very tools that are used for protection. The irony of weapons is that their producers claim to protect some but in fact are used for destroying the others. The sarcastic title, Life Drawing, is of a drawing of human figure on the digital print of a wall in Kabul that is splattered with bullet holes. The most appalling of his works is the video installation, Dinner for Two, in which a video is playing under a transparent container showing the common people from top. The container is 'surrounded' by cutlery with weapons and barbed-wires printed on them. The use of common people as a 'main course' consumed by wars and conflicts is the most appropriate metaphor for these times, yet serving as a fuel for the war lords and the media, hence given the romantic title.

The subject of the academic result, unlike other art exhibitions, is common with every degree show when one interacts with these fresh graduates. The factors influencing and shaping ideas of the young artists at art institutes are somewhat different than the rest of the practicing artists: mainly the need to justify their work to a select audience, the peer pressure, the need to get approval from their teachers and the like. While not undermining the importance of the process that harbours learning and better understanding of the arts, a linear application of it sometimes has adverse effects on the creative individuality. This creative milling produces the individuals who will form the future expression of this region on varied mediums. Gloominess aside, the hope in their eyes and their smiles aspire nothing less than a better future.

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Published in The News on Sunday

http://jang.com.pk/thenews/jan2009-weekly/nos-25-01-2009/enc.htm#2