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    Art Review: Unmaking History-Changing Past Narratives

    Written by: Khadijah Rehman
    Posted on: November 04, 2019 | | 中文

    Saat Daryaon Ke Pani Se Dhuli Meri Rooh, Phir Bhi Rahi Gadli by Natasha Jozi

    The artist takes on many a role in his lifetime: a student and a master, a storyteller and soothsayer, and perhaps most consequential of all, a historian. If art stems from personal or collective experiences, an artist is a chronicler, painstakingly recording events from the past and documenting histories, making sense out of bygone events and the many meandering aftereffects that stem from these happenings.

    History, like a vivid tapestry, asserts itself to be an absolute, when in reality, in order to comprehend this tapestry, it is essential that one must look at the hands that have woven it. What if our history, much like all our other recalled experiences as human beings, is subjective? What if history is a shape-shifting entity, forever changing and altering form - a face that keeps transforming upon viewing?

    Curated by Natasha Malik, Saher Sohail and Laila Rahman, in “Unmaking History” at the Research and Publication Centre in Lahore, an assortment of contemporary artists has put together a show that rewrites the past, while questioning the dominant perspectives that have shaped and contaminated history.

    Anushka Rustomji’s “All’s Fair in Love and War (I)” is a faint image of a city gate, created by making miniscule perforations in paper. The drawing is that of the famous Babylonian Ishtar Gate, which was uprooted and transported to Berlin to be displayed at the Pergamon Museum. The illustration of the gate is intensely detailed, sharp perforations coming together to form an image that is highly textural and intricate and yet ghostly in its making. It appears to the eye as if the gate has disappeared from view, leaving behind a mere imprint of itself, becoming in the process a metaphor for the East after colonization from the West.

    All’s Fair in Love and War (I) by Anushka Rustomji

    Saba Khan’s “Neela Dharpan” draws a link between the glamorization of the subcontinent and the glamorization of local contemporary art that is steeped in tradition. In exploring one such aspect of South Asian contemporary art, Khan focuses on the motif of the carpet, which has become an emblem of appeasement, pleasing the colonizing sensibilities of the West. Khan uses as her surface an indigo-dyed cloth in remembrance of the East India Company’s coercing of the local farmers to plant indigo crops.

    Neela Dharpan by Saba Khan

    The image of a carpet has been stenciled onto this indigo cloth in dust that the artist has collected from excavation sites that have resulted from road expansions in Lahore. The artist’s drawing of the carpet has motifs of smoke billowing industrial buildings, adding another layer to a work that comments on colonization, industrialization, capitalism and orientalism.








    Amna Suheyl’s series of aquatint prints, arranged as if frames in a visual story, has to do with the event of displacement, or perhaps the echoing aftereffects that follow. In retelling the story of the gigantic shift caused by migration, Suheyl has created a beginning and an end, presenting history as the relationship between cause and effect.

    They Were Floating (detail) by Amna Suheyl

    The color palette of her prints, in its blue blackness, is not only nostalgic but almost ethereal, creating a narrative that appears to be otherworldly, as if it exists not in the past or the present but in a third, unknown space.

    Farazeh Syed’s “I Dance with You Between the Worlds” is a large painting in acrylics on canvas. A woman lounges comfortably, a plate in hand, surrounded by vibrant foliage and strange bird and animal forms. Syed explores the depiction of women, and the exoticism, sensuality and objectification that accompanies these depictions.

    I Dance with You Between the Worlds by Farazeh Syed

    In looking at how the male gaze has shaped the representation of the female gender in art, Syed has recreated the portrayal of the woman as a rebellion against art history, creating an experience that is free of patriarchal prejudice or preference. The woman in the painting is real and relevant, a subject instead of an object, larger than life not in her quality of being a feminine motif but in her air of imperfection.

    When considering the reimagining of history, it is unsettling to consider how individual and collective narratives have been tainted by biased perspectives or dominant systems. In Unmaking History, nineteen artists have grappled with both personal and universal histories to rewrite their past and reexamine their present, a fruitful exploration that speaks volumes about the compelling power of word and image.

    “We shall not cease from exploration
    And the end of all our exploring
    Will be to arrive where we started
    And know the place for the first time.”
    - T. S. Eliot - Four Quartets.


    As the new year begins, let us also start anew. I’m delighted to extend, on behalf of the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and in my own name, new year’s greeting and sincere wishes to YOULIN magazine’s staff and readers.

    Only in hard times can courage and perseverance be manifested. Only with courage can we live to the fullest. 2020 was an extraordinary year. Confronted by the COVID-19 pandemic, China and Pakistan supported each other and took on the challenge in solidarity. The ironclad China-Pakistan friendship grew stronger as time went by. The China Pakistan Economic Corridor projects advanced steadily in difficult times, become a standard-bearer project of the Belt and Road Initiative in balancing pandemic prevention and project achievement. The handling capacity of the Gwadar Port has continued to rise and Afghanistan transit trade through the port has officially been launched. The Karakoram Highway Phase II upgrade project is fully open to traffic. The Lahore Orange Line project has been put into operation. The construction of Matiari-Lahore HVDC project was fully completed. A batch of green and clean energy projects, such as the Kohala and Azad Pattan hydropower plants have been substantially promoted. Development agreement for the Rashakai SEZ has been signed. The China-Pakistan Community of Shared Future has become closer and closer.

    Reviewing the past and looking to the future, we are confident to write a brilliant new chapter. The year 2021 is the 100th birthday of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Pakistan. The 100-year journey of CPC surges forward with great momentum and China-Pakistan relationship has flourished in the past 70 years. Standing at a new historic point, China is willing to work together with Pakistan to further implement the consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries, connect the CPEC cooperation with the vision of the “Naya Pakistan”, promote the long-term development of the China-Pakistan All-weather Strategic Cooperative Partnership with love, dedication and commitment. Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the founding father of Pakistan said, “We are going through fire. The sunshine has yet to come.” Yes, Pakistan’s best days are ahead, China will stand with Pakistan firmly all the way.

    YOULIN magazine is dedicated to promoting cultural exchanges between China and Pakistan and is a window for Pakistani friends to learn about China, especially the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. It is hoped that with the joint efforts of China and Pakistan, YOULIN can listen more to the voices of readers in China and Pakistan, better play its role as a bridge to promote more effectively people-to-people bond.

    Last but not least, I would like to wish all the staff and readers of YOULIN a warm and prosper year in 2021.

    Nong Rong Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of
    The People’s Republic of China to the Islamic Republic of Pakistan
    January 2021









    Video message by Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed on Black Day of Indian Occupation of Kashmir



    Video message by Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed on Black Day of Indian Occupation of Kashmir, 27 October 1947, when Indian military troops forcibly occupied Kashmir illegally, claiming a fraudulent ‘Instrument of Accession’ which never existed as documented by eminent British historian Alastair Lamb! Kashmir & Palestine are examples of illegal occupation & continued Resistance to Repression! There are so many commonalities in Kashmir & Palestine: both under brutal military occupation of foreign powers, both are facing an indigenous, popular, spontaneous & widespread Resistance & Uprising, both are in violation of UN Resolutions which haven’t been implemented, both are witnessing an attempted change in the demographic balance, both are facing the use of rape as a weapon of war, both are testimony to double-standards & hypocrisy of Western powers on human rights & fundamental rights, and both conflicts have an element of racism and Islamophobia, while enduring peace, security and stability will remain elusive in both regions, South Asia & Middle East, until these issues are resolved in accordance with popular aspirations.