Pakistani artist’s work featured as a ‘destination masterpiece’ in UK

The Guardian named Waqas Khan’s installation 'Khushamdeed II' in their ‘75 great artworks to see’ listicle

Lahore’s Waqas Khan, an artist’s installation titled Khushamdeed II was featured in The Guardian’s “Destination masterpiece” listicle that featured “75 great artworks to see across the UK.” The publication wrote that their critics chose the most “intriguing and important paintings, sculptures, installations” for people to experience in the summer—and it’s a big honour that Khan’s artwork made the cut with a sign that’s in Urdu.

Khan’s Khushamdeed II (2017) is essentially a series of neon signs placed near the entrances to Manchester Art Gallery, Manchester Museum and The Whitworth, linking the three venues with a warm greeting to people across the city.

Khan chose the word Khushamdeed because its a ceremoniously significant word from Indo-Persian vocabulary. According to him, “It represents the liberating feel of anonymity and a judgement-free passage, where there is no discrimination or distinction. Its literal meaning is to salute a newcomer with kindness, to receive and entertain hospitably and cheerfully to welcome a visitor or a new idea.”

His signs greeting welcome can be read straight bright and straight from when one enters the galleries. Khan, originally from Lahore, is an artist who creates cosmic drawings and paintings that generate waves of mystery. The British publication described his thought process as “almost trance-like experiences.”

“Khan toils for months to make a single piece with painstaking marks that suggest almost trancelike experiences. There’s a warm, optimistic vision in all his work – here stated simply in a neon that says ‘welcome’ in Urdu,” wrote the publication.