As we approach the 71st anniversary of the subcontinent’s partition, we find an extra­ordinary collection of works of visual art on display at the Aicon Gallery in New York City in an exhibition titled Pale Sentinels: Metaphors for Dialogues. Rather than flag-waving, the sound of trumpets, or the wringing of hands at what Partition and the creation of Pakistan have meant for the subcontinent, the collection offers the viewer a range of contemplative expressions from Pakistani and Indian artists.

Inspired by the work that Delhi-based artist Priya Ravish Mehra has done with darners (rafoogars) in recent years — before her untimely death in May 2018 — the show offers meditations on a secondary meaning of the word “rafa” (cementing broken friendship, affecting reconciliation and reparation). It reflects on both statements of loss and people-to-people efforts at mending the fences. Each work tries to reach out to the cultural siblings across the political boundaries made through the cartographic exercise of Cyril Radcliffe at the end of the British Raj.

The title of the show is taken from a Faiz Ahmed Faiz poem, Zindaan ki Ek Subh (Dawn of a Prison) in which those who guard Faiz and other political prisoners are just as oppressed as those who they keep an eye on. The artists exhibited here explore not just the human depredation of Partition but the impulse to depict, mend and repair its pain and loss.

A show offers a range of contemplative artworks made by Pakistani and Indian artists against the backdrop of Partition

Perhaps the most emblematic pieces are two tattered shawls exchanged between Mehra and the textile artist/designer Shehnaz Ismail of Karachi, who was born in India before Partition. Rafoogars on either side of the border first did preliminary mending and darning which was then taken over by the two artists. They, in turn, overworked the patching with stitching of their own. There is no attempt to disguise the repair work; rather the patching is showcased, stands out, is colourful and offers the viewer rushes of vibrancy, even hope. On the shawl that was worked by Ismail, the famous Punjabi poem by Amrita Pritam, “Mein Teinu Phir Milangi” (I will meet you yet again) is silkscreened. Its final verse speaks of overcoming the body that disappears with death:

… the threads of memory
are woven with enduring specks.
I will pick these particles,
weave the threads,
and I will meet you yet again.

A very different approach is taken up by the Dubai-based Saba Qizilbash, whose series of triptychs in graphite on watercolour board explore the theme(s) of fences, walls, buildings, water, bridges and landscapes. The artworks condense all of these (and more) to represent road trips between Pakistani and Indian cities. It is as though she has amalgamated the half-a-dozen or so smaller works in graphite also on exhibit in the show.

Then there are artists who explore what Partition does to language. Among these are Ghulam Muhammad, Mehra and Waqas Ahmed, who take words and scripts and rework them. In most of their works, the dilemmas of language are represented by text that is variously cut up and reassembled — as in Muhammad’s three-dimensional collages such as ‘Untitled’ in ink on wasli, or his triptych ‘Yaad Dasht’ (Recollection) which resonates with Mehra’s three pieces entitled ‘Invisible/Visible.’

Khan explores the process of having had language imposed upon him: as a Baloch, he has to navigate both Urdu and English as a citizen of Pakistan. ‘Yaad Dasht’ evokes what qualities of expressions are lost and found in the exercise. Sometimes texts appear partially in washed-out shadows, sometimes in disjointed words. Faded biographic photographs can be seen juxtaposed with script, perhaps awaiting the moment when they may re-emerge.

Waqas Khan is more indirect. Born into a family that experienced Partition in Southern Punjab, his focus points inward. We discern many dots and dashes not (yet) emerging into verbal communication. Textures and shapes emerge, but no words at all. The pieces displayed here suggest a tentative mood with their palette of black, white and grey.

Ismail, on the other hand, ties up pain into bundles — both small and larger — situating them on panels of handwoven fabric. Sometimes the bundles are filled with seeds or lentils to represent what a devastated land can still bring forth (such as in ‘What Have They Done to My Land?’); sometimes barbed wires protrude from within them, representing pain that has no words.

A particularly striking work is ‘All My Hopes’, a large piece whose two handwoven panels of black and white cloth are visibly stitched toward the top in red cross-stitch. A large bundle sits at its foot, resting on terracotta, while mannat threads and Sufi amulets spill over and down the sides. Bombay resident Shilpa Ghosh is represented here by a sculpture, encased in glass, that is a jamdani sari, unravelled and then re-rolled into a ball. The only Bengali artist in the show, Ghosh also offers the photographic five-frame digital print, ‘Border Sky,’ which demonstrates how the sky looks on both sides of the border.

Faiza Butt’s acrylic paintings on paper teem with colour and energy. In a large diptych titled ‘My Love Plays in Heavenly Ways,’ the borders between the two halves are fluid. I was also pleasantly surprised by her ceramic black-and-white bowls titled ‘Dinner Dialogues’.

Three pieces by the revered Indian painter Nilima Sheikh remind us of why she enjoys such a good reputation. Having explored the crisis in Kashmir (inspired by the late, great Agha Shahid Ali’s collection of poems, The Country Without a Post Office) the three works displayed here are gentle studies of displacement and loss — that of house, home, familiar landscapes — in a reworked, miniature style.

“Pale Sentinels: Metaphors for Dialogues — A Tribute to Priya Ravish Mehra,” curated by Salima Hashmi, was held at the Aicon Gallery in New York City from June 28 to July 28, 2018

Published in Dawn, EOS, August 12th, 2018