Hundreds of art buff poured in at the new campus of the National Art Gallery which was opened last night by President General Pervez Musharraf in a hushed atmosphere, reminiscent of colonial era.
Only a few officials and even a lesser number of handpicked artists were invited to the inaugural function. Speaking on the occasion the President urged the artist's community to involve themselves seriously in fighting against extremist and terrorist tendencies in the society. The general publics as well as the practitioners of art were kept away from not only the opening event.
One of the attractive feature of the NAG, which was opened for the public on Sunday, was a series of about seven sculpted pieces showing women covered in burqa, thereby featuring a recent trend in hijab fashion, which has even overtaken the western world, reminding us of "fashion seminar" hosted by Nordstrom in 2003 in the USA, to portray the increasing number of mansions and mosques full of Muslim women of Virginia dressed in chic hijab.
Naeem Pasha, the architect who designed the huge 1 6,200 square feet complex, in which about 700 calligraphy, paintings, abstract work and sculptures have been put on display, was explaining the identity of Pakistan arts to BBC corespondent Barbara, inviting her to look at the miniatures of Shazia Sikander, whose work best defined Pakistani identity.
Calligrapher Rashid But, was seen explaining calligraphic exhibition he has curetted in one of the 14 art galleries built in the Complex.
The hall was crowded with specimens of works of attractive calligraphic paintings of Haneef Ramay, Ahmad Khan, Khurshid Gohar Qalam, Taj Zareen Qalam, Hafiz Yousaf, and other best known calligraphers.
Unfortunately, the work of Yousaf Dehlavi, the famous calligrapher who had designed in 1947 the Urdu tughras of Pakistan Government, was not there. A music session in the evening really put pep in the first day's opening of the NAG.
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