Remembering the art legend Ghulam Rasul aka GR, who left the scene on December 3, 2009, the Pakistan National Council of the Arts (PNCA) is all set to commemorate the famous landscape painter through holding his painting exhibition and condolence reference on December 13 at the National Art Gallery (NAG).
Ghulam Rasul, a maestro whose second death anniversary was observed on Saturday (December 3), was known for his GR signature embossed on each painting, which made him one of the most admired and celebrated landscape painters of the country, who introduced a new dimension to the art of painting in Pakistan by portraying rural life in his masterpieces.
Ghulam Rasul, born on November 1942, is famous for his impressions of Islamabad and its environs, the particular way of life of the area coloured by the austere beauty of the landscape and its nomadic heritage.
Also a former director general of the PNCA, GR, with amazing dexterity, rendered the images like rustic scene, urban setting with multi coloured kites interspersed in the sky, raindrops blurring the horizon and cattle out in the open fields.
GR was fondly known as the man of green and yellow fields, and of buffaloes shown as distant dark smudges, and men and women seen in red and white clothes, breaking the green and grey of the plains. The enduring preoccupation with the theme has gone through many phases that are not easy to explain and he worked untiringly with a profound understanding of his theme and medium. He learnt the history and theory of art and worked on the strength of his line as the basic requirement of art. He looked at the Pakistani landscape away from the cities and into the fields of grain and mustard and on the stretches of greens and yellows.
With an amalgam of the abstract, the minimal art of his own, and with rich and flat areas of yellow and green, he created dreamy landscapes, well grounded in the reality of agriculture. In the brightly lit pale and orange and grey canvases the pale leaves fall like rain, they come in a gust, like a shower as the viewer feels the rush, the smell and the rustle.
In the background are the leafless trees shorn of their robes and awaiting spring to acquire a new leafy shawl depicting beautiful compositions.
Ghulam Rasul, whose works are part of many international collections, did his masters from the Punjab University (PU), Lahore, in 1964 and later taught art and history at both the PU and Northern Illinois University USA.
His work on display includes Smithsonian Institute Washington DC, Philadelphia Museum of Art and NIU Board of Regents, Springfield, in the United States along with Bradford Museum and Galleries (UK), while his pieces are available at National Museum Lahore, Peshawar Museum, National Art Gallery Islamabad, Agricultural University Faisalabad, Administrative Staff College, Foreign Office, Prime Minister’s House, Pakistani embassies and private collections in various countries.
He was associated with paintings of Punjab’s landscapes, but also trained in printmaking and experienced with still life and calligraphy, as well as founding Flat Art. The Flat art is the melding of the minimalist technique with the palette and themes of Miniature Art, to capture the people and places of Pakistan. The artist was awarded the President’s Award for Pride of Performance in 1986. GR joined the Department of Fine Arts at the PU as a teacher and worked in many media, including printmaking, besides painting figures and objects and started on a career of winning recognition for his work.
Soon afterwards, he was accepted as a student and teacher by the Northern Illinois University in the US. At Dekalb, he had complete freedom to work and study the latest trends in the world of art.
He was exposed to the theory and practice of minimalism, in which the objects were reduced to their essential shapes with eliminated details and bight colours. When he came to Islamabad to receive his prize in 1973, he was offered to take over the visual arts section at the PNCA as a director. He accepted the position and stayed on to retire as the director general.
GR became famous for painting mustard scenes. As a painter he looked inward at his home for inspiration and learnt that from his trip to the United States. Way back, while he was still in Lahore and had not yet become famous as GR, late Safdar Mir had predicted that one day Ghulam Rasul would achieve fame in the world of art.
At the Punjab University, GR was trained as a painter under Khalid Iqbal and Prof Anna Molka Ahmad. Later, he worked with Stanley William Hayter at Atelier 17, Paris.
The contributions of Ghulam Rasul to the field of art would always be remembered, as he was a fine painter having command over his masterly skills.
Talking to Pakistan Today, PNCA Director General Tauqir Nasir said GR’s services as the head of PNCA would be remembered.
“GR was like an art academy in his person and always quick to share his unique painting skill with the next generation for which he also founded Studio-542.” Ghulam Rasul’s colleagues at the PNCA are full of praise for him. The visual arts director, Musarrat Naheed Imam, said his death was a loss to art and his legacy of art would never be forgotten.
Lok Virsa ED Khalid Javed said GR enjoyed a unique repute among the community of the folk artists. He gave a new dimension to the art of painting in Pakistan by depicting and portraying village life in his masterpieces.