Landscape art: Rural Punjab, contemporary Lahore on display

Event aims at honouring art teachers and artists playing a pivotal role in shaping up tradition in landscape painting.

LAHORE:

An exhibition titled Landscapes, Cityscapes and Related Conceptual Paintings opened at the contemporary art gallery of the Lahore Museum on Thursday. The exhibition portrays rustic Punjab and contemporary Lahore.

As many as 74 landscape paintings by 33 artists, contemporary and old, will remain on display until December 31.

Among the works displayed, those worthy to be mentioned are Paisa Akhbar Street in hues of gray, blue and white by Ajaz Anwar, pigeons dotting the rooftop of a typical Walled City home by Matloob Baig and the rooftop view of homes from the Wazir Khan Mosque by Ghulam Mustafa.

The event was arranged by Dr Rahat Naveed Masud, principal of College of Art and Design at the Punjab University, Dr Barabara Schmitz, a visiting faculty at the PU, and Lahore Museum Curator Dr Kanwal Khalid.

The event aimed at honouring art teachers and artists playing a pivotal role in shaping up the tradition in landscape painting. Khalid said the exhibition had brought together the works of some very famous landscape painters. The rustic Punjab landscapes capturing a dust storm and mustard field by Allah Bukhsh were contributed by the museum. Dr Masud, who took months to compile the genre under one roof, said the exhibition was initially planned to honour landscape artists graduating from the College of Art and Design, but then works by other artists were also included. She said it had been decided to keep the works on display until December 31 so that artists, students, scholars and teachers could study the development of landscape artistry chronologically, particularly in the Punjab, as most landscape artists in Pakistan were from here.

One can find landscape pieces as old as 1940 and 1950s by legendary artists Allah Bukhsh, Khalid Iqbal, Anna Molka and Chughtai and as recent as late 2000 by Aneela Zulfiqar, Muhammad Arshad and Mughees Riyaaz.

Dr Masud said the event also meant to honour Khalid Iqbal, the most renowned graduate from the College of Art and Design and the only living artist from amongst  the old landscape masters of Pakistan.

A catalogue with notes on 33 artists and their 74 works was also handed out to visitors.

Art critic Quddus Mirza, who has contributed one of his landscapes from 1984 to the exhibit, said it was refreshing to see the landscape painting evolution documented at the Lahore Museum.

Dr Barbara Schmitz, who has come from the USA to supervise M.Phil students, helped Masud put together the display and compile the catalogue. She also expressed her thoughts about the history, evolution and popularity of landscape painting in Pakistan, particularly in the Punjab. Artists Ijazul Hassan, Quddus Mirza, NCA principal Dr Shabnum Khan, Rukhsana David, Dr Musarrat Hassan and Erum Zia attended the opening.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 23^rd, 2012.