Written by: Nimra Khan
Posted on: July 21, 2023 | 
| 中文
Substance by Muzammil Khan
Every artist takes inspiration from their surroundings and this influence is inevitable, whether it is explicit or implicit. It is next to impossible to detach oneself from everyday lived experiences when creating something as subjective as art, where context plays an important role in every aspect of the work. A recent group show at Canvas Gallery, The Kind of Nature, brings together seven artists: Niamat Nigar, M. Muzammil Khan, Haider Ali Naqvi, Faheem Abbas, Yaseen Khan, Hamid Ali Hanbhi and Fawad Jafri. Their work responds to or is a product of their physical environment and its intersection with culture and politics, in a more direct and conscious capacity. “The show highlights each artist’s unique response to the environment of today, be it natural or man-made, constructed or demolished, ancient or new.”
Many of the artists employ material and process to reflect the environment. Faheem Abbas’s sculptural forms resemble excavated artifacts, yet fashioned with concrete, they become relics of our urban situation that is swiftly conquering the natural world. Meant to represent our present for an imagined future, these forms offer suggestions for our deities, the values that we may immortalize for future generations to find and learn about our way of life.
(L to R) No. 381 by Faheem Abbas and Polygonal Triangle I by Fawad Jafri
Materiality and process is also an important concern for Niamat Nigar. He combines tapestry, embroidery and painting in a sort of abstract mixed media collage that forge a relation between human nature and its surroundings. “My inquiry is rooted in history, particularly my own experience of digging in the coal mines of Baluchistan,” says Nigar in his statement. The play of material and texture in these works engages the tactile senses, adding depth in layers, while the interaction of paint, embroidery and cutting records different forms of human actions, both creative and destructive, healing and violent. The current series layers materials sourced from the city of Karachi, its forms, lines and rough texture thus becoming an apt representation of the metropolis.
Stack and Pile by Niamat Nigar
Materials sourced from the environment also become a part of Haider Ali Naqvi’s work, but in a rather unexpected way. Here the material also becomes the process, as the artist records the impact of natural forces like the sea water and sunlight on manmade structures in coastal areas, such as Karachi. “The House Between Tides” series presents 5 drawings of a beachfront hut, each submerged in sea water from the Arabian Sea for varying amounts of time, resulting in drawings with varying degrees of erosion. It speaks of the tussle between man and nature, where the built environment is constantly being slowly and subtly reclaimed by nature.
The House Between Tides II by Haider Ali Naqvi
M. Muzammil Khan’s work focuses on a built environment, but of the personal kind, with a political undertone. Notions of memory are explored as the artist’s childhood home is reconstructed in paint, once forcefully demolished to make way for the Lyari Expressway. The underlying emotions are encapsulated in a physical artifact that the artist fixates upon, which stands as a crumbling monument to lives lived within its walls. The image is constructed in layers, adding further depth to its cavernous openings, a dark representation of an uncertain future within the remnants of a destructed past.
3:15 pm by Hamid Ali Hanbhi
Yaseen Khan’s environmental landscape is constructed and viewed through a cultural lens. “Growing up in both Sindh and Khyber PakhtunKhwah (KPK) and now living in Punjab, I have been able to absorb the vast cultural landscapes they have to offer,” says Khan. He expresses this by incorporating Chamak Patti used for the art of truck decoration into his work as a medium, which is part of his personal experience working as a mechanic and truck decorator from a young age. The result is an amalgamation between nature and synthetic materials, the shiny foil reflecting rainbow shades as it catches the light, interspersed with images of trees and patterns of flat color.
Jacaranda Mimosilfolia by Yaseen Khan
The hybrid between natural and built environment in each artist’s work reflects our current situation, caught between two worlds as man conquers the natural world and spreads its concrete empire further and wider. It is an opportunity to reflect on the consequences of this greed, and the ways in which the devastation adversely affects not just the environment, but humanity itself.
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