DHAKA: “This is the chaotic city, but it’s disappearing fast,” says leading Bangladeshi artist Kazi Salahuddin Ahmed, waving a hand towards a timeless scene unfolding on the banks of Dhaka’s Buriganga river. Sinewy labourers carry sacks of vegetables and spices off boats on their heads, large metal hooks in hand to keep their loads balanced.
Ahmed, 41, has been painting scenes like this in Dhaka’s old quarter for nearly two decades. The labourers take the sacks to nearby spice and vegetable markets through a labyrinthine network of lanes and alleys.
It’s all a world away from the newer parts of the capital with their wide avenues, ATMs and neon-lit burger bars. Here people are crammed into every available corner; the buildings clustered together so tightly that it is hard to see where one ends and another starts.
Swarms of flies buzz about and the air is infused with the combined aroma of spices, filth, and food sizzling in oil. “I went to Paris but I think I still prefer this place,” adds Ahmed, whose work depicts the part of the city where he was born and brought up.
“In Paris everything was so pristine, there were no insects anywhere, not even a caterpillar.
“Things never stop here and everyone knows each other. The vegetable market is open until six in the morning.” But Ahmed’s cherished old city is under threat — from property developers who are bulldozing many of its old buildings to make way for money-spinning new apartment blocks.
The pace of change is so rapid that Ahmed says he needs to capture as much as possible on canvas before it disappears forever.
“I want people to be able to get some flavour of old Dhaka through my paintings because I cannot stop the development. I want to have something to show the next generation.”
Ahmed has been drawing his inspiration from old Dhaka since starting his career in 1987.
Since then he has held 17 solo exhibitions including ones in Australia, Japan, China, India and the United Kingdom.
Although he has previously worked in oil, his most recent works are aerial views of the city using a collage technique that conveys its sense of chaos and overcrowding.
Gallery owners say his paintings are popular and sell for around 25,000 taka (416 dollars) each, a respectable amount in Bangladesh, one of the world’s poorest countries.
“Ahmed really stands out right now as one of Bangladesh’s leading young artists,” says art critic Mustafa Zaman.
“It’s the way he handles the subject matter. His work is very interesting and he has got this ability to express himself though art.”
Old Dhaka dates back centuries but many of its grandest surviving buildings were constructed in the nineteenth century by wealthy Hindus.
Such properties are now dilapidated and many of the plots have been snapped up by developers.
“It works financially because these buildings take up a lot of space and a developer will get a lot more rent from a multi-storey apartment block,” he says.
The mansions were mostly abandoned at the time of Partition in 1947 when the Indian sub-continent was divided into mainly Muslim East and West Pakistan (now Bangladesh and Pakistan) and mainly Hindu India.
Those that remain have fallen into disrepair although they are still used as homes by numerous families living in squalid, overcrowded conditions.—AFP
