KARACHI: The inaugural Nigaah Art Awards were held at the Mohatta Palace Museum on Saturday evening.

Informing the audience, which comprised a large number of artists and art buffs, on the reasons for instituting the awards, Tauqeer Muhajir said it was first and foremost a tribute to every Pakistani artist, some of them having endured a particularly difficult time in the 1980s when Pakistan went through its dark age — and “came out quite well”. One of the objectives of the awards was to showcase Pakistani art to the rest of the world. Events like these would hopefully get media coverage internationally and Pakistani artists would be shown in a positive light. The event on Saturday was organised within a few months of the first jury meet, he said.

Mr Muhajir thanked all jury members — Amra Ali, Taimur Suri, Marjorie Husain, R. M. Naeem, Adil Salahuddin and jury chair Hameed Haroon. He said hundreds of entries from all over the world from artists of Pakistani origin were received constituting of work that was in public domain between Jan 1, 2016 and June 30, 2017.

Jury chairman Hameed Haroon said he did not like the word award, and would have preferred the word prize. He lauded the jury for their input into making a not-so-easy award into something that’s credible and meaningful. The Nigaah art awards were about recognition and the jury had tried to reflect that sentiment.

Mr Haroon said he did have some quibbles with the philosophy and thinking on art, particularly in Pakistan. “We all know what contemporary art is.” The word contemporary had no meaning whatsoever. It’s simply a label picked up in globalisation to market art.

The word contemporary had affected the work of the jury. “We need to look at what artists are doing today and define some new categories rather than using loose terms. Yes, it’s all right to say still life, it’s all right to say landscape, it’s all right to say portrait… but we need to have clear definitions about the kind of work that comes under installations, performing art and other new areas of art.”

Mr Haroon said art was not about glamour, though it could derive glamour. It was about diligence, hard work and to develop a sense of aesthetics. We needed to widen our horizon in a way that’s meaningful for the future of art. First we need to debunk the notion that this body of art that we saw before us in the country today was contemporary Pakistani art.

After the speeches the prizes were given. The following are the names of the winners: Arif Mahmood (photography), Jamal Ashiqain (special prize photography), Fahim Rao (3D sculptures), Muhammad Zeeshan (curator), Nasreen Askari (special prize curator), Noorul Huda (emerging painter), Asim Akhtar (critic), Adeeluz Zafar (drawing), Irfan Hasan (portrait), Mohammad Ali Talpur (abstract), Shakeel Siddiqui (still life), Shahid Jalal (landscape), Sadaf Naeem (special prize landscape), Huma Mulji (printmaking), Abdullah M. I. Syed (special prize printmaking), Syed Hussain (miniature), Ghulam Mohammad (calligraphy), Salima Hashmi (lifetime achievement) and Marjorie Husain (lifetime achievement).

In between the distribution of prizes, Fawad Khan read out a dastangoi piece and Shehroz Hussain entertained the audience with his sitar playing. Artist Farrukh Shahab made a ‘live painting’ which later went up for auction.

Shehnaz Ramzi anchored the event.

Published in Dawn, August 28th, 2017