With the current political climate worsening by the minute, it is difficult for the citizens to see a silver lining in bleak circumstances. Even for those living in relative comfort, day-to-day life becomes a challenge in a corrupt system and a general feeling of helplessness sets in. Satires inspired from these disillusionments is what most of Feica’s political cartoons feature, aptly commenting on the latest shenanigans of a twisted system. However, when it comes to art, Feica has a more optimistic message to relay to his audience, that of love enduring through it all.

Rafique Ahmed, better known as Feica, is a cartoonist, and most of us are familiar with his political caricatures that he draws for Dawn. His recent show at the Alliance Francaise de Karachi’s art gallery displayed a vast volume of his paintings and drawings as testament to his versatility as an artist. As he puts it, “Whoever I meet, see or confront, including myself, and whatever situation I experience, it becomes a subject of art — of my art — of life as art.”

His style contains the stylistic sensibilities of a caricature artist, with his figures exaggerated and distorted and his strokes bold and determined, abstracted to create ambiguity and layers of meaning. A large number of the line drawings read almost as doodles and contain a sense of spontaneity, while the paintings seem more deliberate. His work has a certain late modernist appeal, with hints of cubism in some of the coloured pieces.

Feica uses art to spread a hopeful message of the endurance of love amidst the prevalent gloom

The intertwined bodies featured in most pieces in various positions seem to talk about love in its various forms, and to encapsulate it at the same time. While certain pieces show an endearing and intimate kind of love, others seem to carry sexual connotations. However, the entangled lines seem to be more than just a stylistic choice and seem to describe the essence of love itself, moving beyond the physical towards the spiritual. The bodies are naked and vulnerable, completely revealed to one another. The closeness makes it impossible to differentiate where one ends and the other begins.

At the same time, we see certain pieces which address ills of society, with a lone figure bound at the wrists reminiscent of our helplessness in the face of adversity, or what seems like a terrorist with arms and ammunition using two individuals as pawns. The symbol of the bird recurs through many of the pieces and seems to tie them together in a narrative. To the artist the bird signifies freedom; it flies as it wants with no care for boundaries. While the restrained man wishes for freedom, it is love that truly frees us, as it knows no bounds — it is universal and limitless.

In our complicated lives, hardly anything is ever black and white, and where there is bad there is always good to counter it. The harsh realities of our society exist, but in spite of that, or maybe because of it, hope has become a necessity. Feica’s work does not just present a rose-tinted view of life where love is the answer the all of life’s problems. It acknowledges the issues we are facing as a nation, but also gives us the positives, and in a way gives us hope. While love might not melt the heart of a corrupt leader, it will enrich our experience of life and make our problems much more bearable.

“Inextricable Love” was on display at the Alliance Francaise de Karachi from the April 22 till April 28, 2017

Published in Dawn, EOS, May 7th, 2017