Art exhibition opens to a riot of colours
Anil Datta
Karachi, with its profusion of art galleries, is surely an artist’s and an art lover’s paradise. Hardly a day goes by without one gallery or the other holding art shows much to the art buffs’ delight.
Just one such show was held at the Grandeur Art Gallery on Tuesday evening, with its walls adorned with 29 works of all schools of art, widely varying in style and content. However, there were some that deserve special mention.
One of these was an untitled work (acrylic on canvas) by Wahab Jaffer. It was just a simple young woman but Wahab’s colouring skills really made the whole thing come alive.
Despite the simplicity, the woman literally has speaking eyes as if she’s trying to convey a message, as if she’s pleading. Another one of his works, again untitled, an acrylic on canvas, is a still life, a flower vase adorned with flowers of the brightest hues set in alluring geometrical patterns.
They give a very soothing effect to the eye and really seem to speak of nature’s artistry. Jaffer is, indeed, a lyrical colourist. He has a characteristic style in which abstract and semi-figurative form is combined with vigorous colouring
Similarly, there’s an untitled work by Frenchman Henri Souffay. In pastel shades, it shows two hands held up as if in the cosmos denoting time and space. He displays a latent mysticism, evident particularly in the focus on the hands —fingers spread in supplication, beckoning, clasped in adoration.
Souffay, a French but resident in Karachi, is better known as a biographer and a conservationist. He has undertaken detailed studies on the cultural and architectural heritage of Karachi.
Then, among the works by Mashkoor Raza, there’s one which could be termed semi-abstract art. If one were to really strain his eyes and brain, one would conclude that it is horses and polo players mounting them.
Mashkoor Raza’s figurative work is prominent the world over as Pakistani art for his rare distinction of having developed his own characteristic style.
His works pivot mostly around women and horses.
Then there’s another painting adorning the walls of the gallery by Mashkoor Raza. It features three women. The artist has done a wonderful job in making the subjects alluring and some might even say, titillating.
The show also featured Sadiq Hussain’s sculptures, seven of them in booth wood and metal. They presented a picture of complicated, mangled structures, all of them totally diverse.
According to the sculptor, the diversity in shapes and sizes was connotative of the diversity and complexity of life’s issues for human beings. The exhibition at Grandeur runs up until June 30, Neshmia Ahmad, the proprietor, said.
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