Independent visual narratives

04 Aug, 2018

Each artist has his independent visual narrative in a three person exhibition titled 'Triple A' at Canvas Gallery, Karachi. The artists following their own style tried to create different visual vocabulary that portrays certain social factors.
Most of the works were a dialogue between the artist and the imagery and at the same time inviting the viewer to be a quiet spectator. But the images served as a beginning point of a conversation about different issues. The artists have different sources of inspiration therefore they reflected various aspects of life and also artists' perception about life. Afshar Malik was inspired by the daily life in mountainous region. The snow top mountains, fast flowing blue river water, lush green mountain slopes and small and large stones scattered here and there creating their own landscape with in a landscape inspired him the most.
He portrayed daily life in hilly areas in a wooden house in a painting titled "A House" where wet laundry dries outside the house which was build over a stream that flows beneath the house giving it a fairy tale look. He dreamed of a life away from noise, away from pollution, away from violence, a life full of happiness and tranquility.
A painting titled "From Here, I Can See" depicted a man enjoys beautiful weather and the sight of hills and rivers and felt on top of the world as if he can see everything from the hilltop. In another painting a horse seemed to be enjoying his freedom galloping beside a river between the hills.
Ali Kazim's work rendered weather that is one of the main aspects of life on earth. Weather decides how people live their lives in a specific area on land. His works consists of various lightening, storm, land and cloud series paintings that presented weather conditions effectively.
The black and white artworks reflected the inclement weather where rough and stormy weather seemed to come out of the paintings. The lightening, the clouds, the stormy dusty winds were trying to come out of the frame and blow the things away.
According to Ahmed Ali Manganhar his works revolved around the European art history and local cinema heroes. Viewers may find images of known and unknown local icons in his paintings.
The black and white as well as colour works by Ahmed showed blur images of people. His works were full of shadowed contours. Silhouettes of men and women can be seen in his works but without specific facial or body features.
All of his paintings represented characters in his mind in the form of cut outs in black or white colour and sometimes a crowd or gathering of people in monochrome. This way he showed the dark side of society that engulf people's lives lacking concerns of its consequences. The shadowy figures were symbolically painted which show people fading away even in a crowd or gathering. Some figures were dancing in the background like a few elite which least bother about other people.
All the artists are alumnus of the National College of Arts (NCA), Lahore, while Afshar Malik and Ali Kazim are also faculty members of NCA.

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