A month-long exhibition of historic pottery “Lost and Found-Prehistoric Pottery Treasures from Balochistan” was opened on Friday.
The exhibition has been jointly organised by the government of Sindh, National Museum of Pakistan, Museum of Islamic Art – National Museums Berlin, and the Consulate General, Federal Republic of Germany. Funding was generously provided by the cultural preservation programme of the German foreign office.
This heritage is testimony to the presence of many different people such as Greeks, Kushan, Arabs, Persians, and Turks, and the legacy of dynasties – Ghaznavids, Soomros, and Mughals. Today, the Indus valley culture is one of Pakistan’s main cultural assets.
Speaking on the occasion, Special Assistant to CM Sindh for Culture and Tourism Sharmila Faruqui said that Pakistan was a great country hosting the amazing heritage of the past two million years – Mohenjo Daro, Makli Hills, Banbhore, and Ranikot Fort – to name just a few.
German Consul General Rainer Schmiedchen said that many of Pakistan’s cultural assets were increasingly threatened by the expansion of cultivated land sand settled space, building of infrastructure and an ever expanding illegal antiquity market. This is not only true for Balochistan, but also for Sindh and other provinces. Yet, due to their artistic quality, vessels from Baluchistan achieve increasingly higher market values.
Dr Ute Franke, the lady behind all this arrangements and interests, said the cultural heritage of Balochistan was renowned for its high quality craftsmanship and beauty displayed by intricate geometric patterns on clay vessels betraying a surprising aesthetic sense, and by hybrid creatures and magic animals that provide a glimpse into a world of fantasy and imagination.
After a careful documentation and conservation, the German team, with Dr Ute Franke, Elisa Cortesi and Carmen Guetschow, has now completed the project in close collaboration with the staff of the national museum Pakistan, Karachi, in particular Muhammad Shah Bukhari and Ejaz Elahi as curator in charge.
When the research extended to Balochistan and the Indo-Iranian borderlands, and subsequent explorations and excavations, carried out under difficult conditions in the early 20th century and post-partition times, it left no doubt that this vast and now mostly deserted and dry region was a key area on this long path to civilisation.
The beginning of this development was pushed back in history once again by almost 4,000 years with the discovery of Mehrgarh in the 1970s, to a time, when mobile hunters and food gatherers settled down and began to domesticate plants and animals.
“This is first of its kind exhibition in Karachi and I am delighted that today we have gathered here to celebrate this remarkable recovery of an almost lost treasure trove with the inauguration of an exhibition which showcases about 140 vessels from this collection at the National Museum of Pakistan, Karachi, to the general public. Grouped according to themes and accompanied by graphic displays, the exhibition provides a fascinating look into the formation of the most ancient civilization in South Asia,” said Dr Ute Franke.
The exhibition will continue till 20th December 2015 for general public at the national museum of Pakistan Karachi.
