A curious piece of art drags people to it on Eduljee Dinshaw Road — a large spool with every imaginable animal, bird, flora and fauna found in Pakistan, it stands proudly among pre-Partition buildings and a temple in one of the oldest neighbourhoods in the city.

The artwork, a creation of wildlife artist Maurizio Boscheri, is a present from the Italian government to the citizens of Karachi to celebrate the rich biodiversity of Pakistan, and a part of the Karachi Biennale Trust.

The spool or large wooden cable-reel is one of many pieces of art on display as part of ‘Reel On Hai,’ a project undertaken by the Karachi Biennale team. Many others can be seen all over the city, including Orangi, Clifton and Saddar. The chair of this project is Masuma Halai Khwaja who is looking after the biennale’s outreach programme.

The Karachi Biennale — based on the Venice Biennale — is an extensive art project for the public and its exhibitions in October will showcase contemporary art of over 100 local and foreign artists. The biennale, which will take place every alternate year, is focusing on connecting art, the city and its people.

This year’s theme for the biennale is: Witness. It will be held October 22 - November 5 all over the city.

According to artist, writer and managing trustee of the Karachi Biennale Trust Niilofur Farukkh, the biennale brings together innovation and excellence through different curatorial strategies to showcase artists from Pakistan to the world as well as strengthen a regional art exchange.

This year’s theme for the Karachi Biennale is ‘Witness’ — in which artists, writers, poets and the citizens of Karachi are being encouraged to explore the city they live in

Along with the reels, the biennale’s team has held talks around the city and an event to launch their mandate back in January. “We have received a good response so far and are looking forward to the exhibitions later this year,” says Farukkh. “There is this amazing energy out there. We are challenging many barriers which we [people] have made ourselves.

“We will have the artistic space in October and November for two weeks when we will exhibit outside. It will help us see how we are connecting with the city,” she points out.

Discussing the biennale, a first-ever in Karachi, Farrukh explains: “There are many tiers of the biennale. The reels are an external thing where we interact with the people, the second is the discursive, where we interact with the people who are intellectually engaged with issues.”

As a part of this discursive, the biennale’s team has held four sessions on literature, music, women’s rights and exploring the changing city.

Discursive Roundtable

As parts of the Karachi Biennale’s Critical Knowledge Lab, a series of discussions were held since last year focusing on literature, the impact of the women’s rights movement, change in the social and physical contours of Karachi and music since 2000. Everything discussed at these talks will become part of a publication and also be available online.—T.M

Talking about the discursive, Farrukh says it was an extension of her vision of the biennale. “Obviously there is a lot of art around us but in terms of critical thinking we still have to evolve,” she says, adding that there was a great deal of dependency on the Western framework.

“As someone who has been writing for almost four decades I feel we need to start contextualising art in our own way — this comes from inter-disciplinary analysis — and then build on the parallels and what informs a particular discipline,” says the artist who is also the founding editor of NuktaArt, Pakistan’s first contemporary art magazine.

“I edited NuktaArt and brought in [diverse] thinkers together,” says Farrukh. “This has been an extension of that critical framework, to contextualise art and with the biennale and with our theme ‘Witness’. I thought we could use this [opportunity] to explore other disciplines and other issues as well.”

According to Farrukh, literature in our country has evolved along certain lines. “I have been reading a lot of material on how the city has been referenced and again coming to a lot of Western references — but their issues and perspectives are different from ours. Maybe it is time to rethink the template we are using — this is what formed the context of the discursive,” she adds.

Head curator, artist and sculptor Amin Gulgee said that his curatorial team — Humayun Memon, Sara Pagganwala and Zeerak Ahmed — have been working on this year’s theme since last year.

“It has been a tremendous journey — we have over 80 Pakistani artists and 40 international ones along with several curators flying in,” he says. “There is fantastic energy coming in and over eight locations in the city. I am really thrilled to make this happen and very grateful to my team.”

Projects by the Karachi Biennale

Art for Life — A workshop for students from five schools in Orangi in March last year, was to help them understand the building blocks of IT via New Media Art. It was conducted by two German artists, Stephan Kovats and Wolfgang.

Reel On Hai — A year-long project based on the transformation of 100 cable-reels into artworks for public spaces all over Karachi such as at the Orangi Pilot Project by Sanki, at St Patricks Cathedral by Feica and Fakeeha, at Jinnah Hospital’s emergency ward by Wajiha, at Customs House on Edulijee Dinshaw Road by Italian artist Maurizio Boscheri, and at the Alliance Fracaise in Clifton by Sahyra Qamar Sultan.

Art Ki Talash — A scavenger hunt which was held in September 2016 was designed to help people discover Karachi through its art and architecture.

Karachi Art Directory — Another year-long research project involving students from all major art schools in the city — in collaboration with the VM Art Gallery.

Urban Regeneration Talk Series — A discussion on urgent urban issues and their solutions.

Global Outreach — The Karachi Biennale has begun to reach out to a global audience — it is a member of the New North South Network that connects biennales in South Asia with the UK’s art institutions. —T.M

Published in Dawn, EOS, May 28th, 2017