ISLAMABAD, Jan 6: An exhibition of murals and paintings by children representing almost every segment of the society was organised at Funkor Child Art Centre here on Monday. Ingeborg Briennes, the representative of UNESCO in Pakistan, was chief guest at the opening ceremony.

Fauzia Minallah has collected the paintings done by children over the last three months and in the process she visited the famous Afghan Basti, the refugee camp in I-11, a Christian colony in the heart of the federal capital, a posh private school and an institute of the hearing-impaired children in Lahore.

One look at the works of these children and one can easily make out as to how they get influenced by their surroundings and how do they feel about the life around them.

The art pieces done by the Afghan boys mostly show helicopters, jets, school buildings, while those done by the Afghan girls invariably show homes. "These children, who are born in these camps in Pakistan and have never practically seen the ugly ravages of war, are still heavily influenced by what is going on back in their country because that is what they learn from their elders and their guests," Ms Minallah said.

"An Afghan child painted a school building with a helicopter hovering over it. And when he was asked to explain, he said the building was a school in which he felt safe, while the helicopter was out there to carry out destruction. This showed how they got influenced by what they listened to in their surroundings," Ms Minallah said.

Similarly, she said the Afghan girls were always painting homes, ovens and household goods because these were the things they lacked and aspired to get them in their dreams.

The paintings collected from the Christian Colony in Islamabad mostly present the Pakistani flag and a Cross. "It is their desire to identify themselves with the country as a Pakistani and Cross clearly represents their strong sentiments and affiliation with their religion," Ms Minallah said.

On the other hand, she said, the children in the expensive private schools painted computers, hi-tech gadgets, and their paintings abundantly reflected the violence they watched in the computer and video games. "This is an entirely different reflection of a life-style," she said.

Most interesting were the paintings submitted by the children from a Lahore-based school for the hearing impaired. Most of these children have painted foreign children and have tried to identify them. "It is a beautiful collection of works done by these children, which reflect their feelings and their desires."