The sustained and complex body of work mounted by Akram Dost Baloch at the Chawkandi Art Gallery, Karachi, was dazzling in its energy and mastery of diverse media that was utterly compelling. The artist’s passionate identification with his surroundings defines his work with explicit clarity.

Through his work, Dost creates an all-embracing compendium of the intrinsic traditions and on-going issues that contribute to the structure of Balochistan. At the same time, his assertion appears as a modern, acutely perceived microcosm, one that directs his aesthetic vocabulary.

“Shenakht” (Identity) was the title of the exhibition showing large oil and acrylic paintings on canvas, a series of oil on canvas portraits, carved wooden panels of Deodar wood and four intricately carved boxes from a collection of 60 artworks. The artist described how he had discovered the boxes dating from the colonial era in auction. These were used by soldiers to carry their belongings and they caught the artist’s attention as he wanted to work on them in his studio. The carved designs on the boxes were linked to the work on display and one marveled at the realisation that there are no limitations to his imagery or its expression which appears as a transformative process.

Exploring Dost’s work on display, one discovered a fascinating, deeply rooted culture manifesting in dynamic surfaces worked in varied ways. His art idiom includes a metaphor in the shape of distorted figuration and wooden surfaces textured in a multiplicity of ways. He examines the complex relationship between disciplines and media and in the process, addresses the human experience in all its fragility. His work includes a brilliant sequence of intricately carved and painted artworks that constitute unprecedented, multi-imaged installations with the presence of sculpture.

Akram Dost Baloch’s art idiom includes a metaphor in the shape of distorted figuration and wooden surfaces

The larger canvas works were textured with numerous layers of oil and acrylic brushed on lightly as watercolours. Myriad designs are created in diverse ways and one discovers patterns of the artist’s thumb prints. The theme of some of the works narrated a story of the heroism of the women who find recourse in hard times, guarding the homes and animals with guard dogs and supporting each other while their menfolk are ‘missing’.

The work also relates references to the mountains, trees, the ancient history of Balochistan and its people. These recent works were painted after a period in which the artist mourned his son and was unable to work until a year ago when his emotions were released on canvas. His brush creates colours that glow from the canvas as if from an inner light, pale gold and subtle shades that highlight a diversity of textures. Included in the exhibition are numerous portraits paying homage to the ‘missing’ members of society, portraits with eyes that narrate history.

Though apparently focused on his own environment, the artist’s work is a dialogue that raises global issues. His mastery of a variety of tools to express the structures of art-making forms a connection with traditions in a unique aesthetic idiom. His work has been acclaimed at home, in Europe and Dubai.

Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, October 25th, 2015

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