In a new series of paintings shown at the Canvas Gallery, Karachi, Nahid Raza uses a range of traditional and contemporary techniques with a revealing translucency of expressive meaning. It is depicted with a repetitive pattern signifying the artist’s personal communication on a higher plane. Shown for the first time in June 2016 at an international event held in Oslo, the artist’s latest work is based on the strength of spiritual depth expressed by the repetition of a single word — the VIRDH. It is an expression that reveals the artist’s thoughts, and the spiritual inspiration reflected.

Raza is an artist who has shown her work globally since 1970, when she emerged upon the art scene to become one of the trendsetters of her generation. But without the support of her uncle Ali Imam, Nahid’s parents would not have allowed her to study art.

Indeed, she completed her BA from the Karachi University at the same time as graduating from the Central Institute of Art and Crafts. She relates how her BA paper and final exams from CIAC were held on the same day. She arrived breathless at the CIAC to find the test had begun and Imam would not allow her to enter the room where the students were at work. She stood outside the room crying until the entire class begged Imam to let her enter; she then proceeded to take the test and did well.

The artist’s recent exhibition, ‘Virdh’, is a reminder of what makes her stand out from the crowd

Throughout the artist’s vocation, she has continued to evaluate singular or personal concerns involving the conventions of traditional miniature painting and contemporary abstraction negotiated through the luminosity of her media. One has viewed the artist’s aesthetic influence with the early Tree series, the Chowkandi Tomb series, and as the first ‘feminist’ painter in the country with the Women Series challenging the position of women in a male-dominated society and exploring issues of women’s rights.

In 1985, Raza showed the Women series for the first time in exhibition and it was reviewed by S. Amjad Ali who wrote: “The 40 large acrylic paintings by Nahid are basically abstract because their charm lies in the design and play of colour. The list of captions shows the artist’s message: ‘Woman — Symbol of Strength’ ; ‘Woman — ‘Not a Sunflower’; and ‘Dance of Freedom.”

Her work has always highlighted objects that have been of vital importance in the shaping of her artistic vision. Through the years Raza has been an outstanding teacher as well as an artist of outstanding potential talent. She has also been the recipient of numerous awards including the President’s Pride of Performance in 2007.

Embracing a range of historic and modern influences, the artist has explored deeply challenging, often painful experiences. Her work expands beyond singular or private concerns to engage in gender, power and vulnerable figures of the world as she sees it.

In the latest series of paintings, the viewer discovers the artist in a compelling mood of spiritual inspiration that is joyful in its repetitive enthusiasm, a mood of meditation transferred on to the canvas with the tangential desire to share the spiritual depth that is all-encompassing.

Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, July 31st, 2016