The Gandhara-art Gallery is running an exhibition of wall-based drawings and artworks rendered directly onto the walls and the floor of the gallery. The show titled ‘Whitewash’ includes works by Abdullah MI Syed, Atif Khan, Reem Khurshid, Sivim A Naqvi and Sumaira Tazeen. ‘Whitewash’ is the first solo curatorial venture of Naqvi who is currently the Assistant Curator at the gallery.
“The idea for this show was inspired during a visit to the South London Gallery (SLG) in August last year to view their show titled ‘Nothing is Forever’, which celebrated the completion of the SLG’s £2 million building project, and brought together wall paintings, drawings and text pieces by 20 British and international artists,” Naqvi said. She wanted to take this concept and negotiate its workings within the confines of a commercial gallery space in Karachi.
She said that in the past, gallerists have allowed artists to manipulate the gallery space, but never on the basis of an initiation by the gallery to have its interior rendered directly upon. And so with this in mind, ‘Whitewash’ came into being, she added. Naqvi said that the wall-based artworks of this exhibition would raise questions about the artist’s production, the significance of the studio, the function of the gallery and the viewer’s experience within the environment of artworks.
“I want the viewer to experience an alternative show; a show in which there is no price tag and no price list. I want the work to be unsalable, rather than ‘Not For Sale’, because really, no matter how much you like a particular work, there’s absolutely no way you can strip away the paint or chip away the wall and take it home with you to keep forever,” she said.
Clearly, she added, the works emerge from acts of passion, labours of love and a real belief, despite being pieces created in the knowledge that they will be destroyed. “As an artist, the desire to photograph your work repeatedly, from the same angle and from different angles, to make sure you have captured its essence, is to ensure that you have immortalised it,” Naqvi said.
“What is important is that the works are immortalised in the framework of the gallery, no matter how many times the wall will be whitewashed. The walls are the medium and point of installation,” she added. The show would continue until August 27. Syed is currently completing a PhD by practice at the College of Fine Arts of the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia.
He has held solo exhibitions of his artwork at Karachi’s VM Art Gallery and at Sydney’s Kudos Gallery. His work has been displayed in group exhibitions across Pakistan and other parts of Asia, as well as Europe and Australia. Khan graduated in Fine Arts from the National College of Arts (NCA) in Lahore, and was awarded the UNESCO-ASHBURG Bursary in 1999, completing a residency at Darat-al-Funun in Amman, Jordan.
In 2005, he was appointed artist in residence at the Swansea Print Studio in Wales. He has exhibited throughout Asia and in the USA, Finland, Germany and Poland. Khurshid, a self-taught artist, freelances in the fields of illustration, fine arts and education. In 2009, her work was published in an annual art book celebrating 100 established and upcoming female illustrators from around the world, and was exhibited at the book launch in Sydney, Australia.
Last year, her solo show ‘Fever Dreams’ received much attention for its innovative live painting and music performance. Rich in myth and metaphor, her fine art work is part of private collections spanning several continents. Naqvi graduated with distinction in Painting from the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture. She has exhibited in several group shows in Karachi and Lahore, and a travelling show across the US.
Tazeen graduated in Miniature Painting from the NCA. She has exhibited throughout Pakistan, including at the National Gallery in Islamabad, and across Europe and the US. In 2008, she curated an exhibition of neo-miniatures at the Indus Valley School Gallery titled ‘Associated Metaphors.’
Photos courtesy Gandhara-Art Gallery
