ISLAMABAD: A group exhibition featuring the works of three National College of Arts (NCA) students depicting monotony of life and melancholy of ageing was inaugurated by Australian High Commissioner Margaret Adamson on Saturday.

Speaking at the Nomad Art Gallery, she praised the artists’ work and the gallery’s initiatives in mentoring and encouraging artistic genius.

“An artist interprets our world through his or her creativity and reflects our collective cultural heritage and the concerns of contemporary society at individual, community, regional and global levels,” Ms Adamson observed.

She also highlighted the difficulties the artists faced in historical perspective and at times battled censorship owing to their depiction of society being at odds with the preferences of the ruling regime, such as the artists that were stripped of their right to be entitled artists in Nazi Germany or those forced to conform to Soviet notions of art.

Some of the works by the exhibiting artists – Ujala Hayat, Sana Ibrahim and Shahaan Ahmed Shah – are powerfully done in the tradition of non-conformism celebrating imperfection. Shades of brown are the dominant colour theme in Mr Shah’s work.

The Quetta native has subtly depicted nature through textile art, incorporating organic materials such as natural colours, cotton, silk, jute coffee along with animal hair and skin.

Inspired by Japanese artist Wabi Sabi’s concept, the artist has very subtly depicted the melancholy of ageing. About the elements in his work, he said, “these are found in nature and undergo the process of ageing over a long period of time.

“Eventually these natural elements translate into a melancholy state of decay. Appreciation of the ageing textures and patterns of nature reminds us of transience,” he remarked.

Sana Ibrahim’s piece Steamer, made up of fish wire and powered by electricity, depicts the monotony of the mechanical life and the human body in motion.

“The steamers use a push and pull mechanism through the help of springs and fish wire. When this was constructed, all the steamers worked at the same pace, however, as time went by, each steamer picked up its individual pace and strength. As they worked on, some springs lost their strength, and others became stiffer. The fish wire was subject to friction, causing it to weaken, and eventually break,” Ms Ibrahim said in a statement.

“I believe my work is a metaphor for what the human life has become: it lacks emotions, and is stuck in the vicious cycle of a repetitive routine, which is eventually disrupted through external factors or ends when we reach our final limit,” it reads.

Ujala Hayat, an Islamabad-based budding artist explained about her oil-on-canvas piece, exploring the subject of pregnancy, and the antecedent feeling of inhabitation.

“Finding myself stuck in monotonous roles deemed normal, my work is a conversation about the biological ability and responsibility associated with my gender that overpowers all other functions I have as a participative member of the society,” Ms Hayat said.

“Depicting myself as a manufacturing machine and an object cast into play to befit a particular purpose; this work reflects my identity crisis with my gender,” she commented. The exhibition will continue until May 24.

Published in Dawn, May 14th, 2018