Psychological space: With burnt leaves and double-sided tape, artists explore raw emotions

The intricate word-pattern made the ‘kharghosh’ and ‘Murgi’ look like poetry.

KARACHI: Pent up raw emotions filled the Indus Valley Gallery on Wednesday.

Salman Toor, Hina Farooqui and Farooq Mustafa came together with five other artists to explore how the individual escapes from the strange and sometimes rather boring thoughts that plague the mind. The gallery walls were lined up with 16 art pieces by the eight artists with a red double-sided tape on plastic installation piece by Sana Obaid titled ‘Epiphany’.

In her artist’s statement, Obaid described her work as a divine manifestation and inspiration. “My work is the outcome of all that I have gone through or am going through,” she said. “The surface I have used is like my mind where so much is going on.” A 24-year-old MA student from the University of Karachi said that it looked like the artist had made world map out of blood or shiny red chips to achieve a domino effect. Muzzamil Ruheel used ink on paper and basic Urdu words to draw a rabbit and chicken. It was simple yet complicated. The pattern created by the words was quite intricate and made the ‘kharghosh’ and ‘Murgi’ look like poetry. Farooq Mustafa’s ‘Ambiguous Journey Series’ had a very pronounced East Asian theme. In his artist’s statement he said that his work was a surreal illustrative exploration of the process of transition. “Looking through myself, I try to pick the ingredients from my surroundings and construct my own version of reality and narrative,” he said. “This body of work is based on my experience of becoming familiar with a foreign environment during the course of my stay in Japan.” He added that the fluidity and freeness of his work helped express his perception, which then helped define his comfort zones. Contemporary painter Salman Toor used oil paints on canvas to create ‘Village Heros’ and ‘Disapproving Uncles’. His work reminded an art student of Rembrandt. “I look at the figures of the three men in the background and I feel like I’m looking at a piece by Rembrandt with a punk twist,” she said pointing towards the polka dots and wavy lines that were splashed over the art piece.

Hina Farooqui’s art piece had a crowded feel to it. It had burnt golden leaves, a stenciled one hundred rupee note and a militant lying low with a gun. The colours really stood out and made people take a second look. Noor us Sabah Saeed’s sketches of animal carcasses were rather disturbing. In her artist’s statement she said that the internal structure of the human body or machines and how they function is what really interests her. Adeel uz Zafar’s GaGa-esque artwork was about his dreams and how they took him on a surreal path of the unknown. He said it was similar to the feeling of floating in an abyss - a sea of microscopic organisms in the deep recesses where life is almost extinct. Scheherezade Junejo Conversation I and II were also showcased at the gallery. The artist had used bold colours to paint a conversation between two bald and naked women.

The show is set to go on till October 22.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 6^th, 2011.