A veteran graphic designer, painter and researcher Aboo Bakr Rana is nostalgic about the peaceful streets and closely knitted social fabric of Lahore during late 60s.Born to a family of Delhi based medical doctors who were settled in Lahore after partition in 1947, he witnessed various phases of socio political life of Lahore.
´The city was almost like a small village, there were hardly few cars in the town. This is unfortunate that phenomena of migration to Western countries created a vacuum which was filled by the rough and aggressive country men, it has drastically changed the color of the city´, he laments.
He was a good swimmer with couple of championship titles to his credit.Time spent at Saint Anthony´s School with his friends and strict Irish teachers with a sharp sense of humor is one of the rich memories of his childhood.
´My father wanted me to carry the family tradition but my academic grades were not good enough to join a medical college. Faced with a couple of traumatic incidents in my childhood, I was unable to concentrate on academic studies. One of my friends suggested me to go to newly formed department of Fine Arts at Punjab University Lahore´, he narrated the story of landing in the Punjab University to earn a degree of Masters in Graphic Designing as a gold medalist in 1969.
´Campus was dominated by the student outfit of Jammat e Islami except for Fine Arts Department created by Anna Molka Ahmed.The environment was open and friendly. Though I was never convinced by the painting style of Anna Molka Ahmed but she was my source of inspiration, a motherly figure and a strict administrator at the same time´, he acknowledges.
Going through thick and thin of life Aboo Bakr Rana spent a major part of his life in United States and Canada.
´When I moved abroad the computer was replacing the manual works in graphic designing. It changed my thinking process , especially the speed of visualizing and creating the designs. I was unable to find work as designer and made a living doing odd jobs. I would work in night shifts and spend days reading books and learning photography´.
He came back to Lahore during early 2000s and joined the Faculty of Institute of Art and Design at University of Punjab.
´I came back to Pakistan with idea that things might have changed here, but unfortunately failed to cope with the working culture of the campus and left the job´, he said in a bitter tone.
He ventured into paintings which were well received by the collectors and art lovers in Lahore.
A keen reader of psychology, especially the phenomena of dreams, he is researching on the subject from last four decades.
´Almost reached the conclusions , about the origin of dreams and how we see things in deep sleep. I am planning to discuss and have it confirmed at academic forums abroad and looking for the resources to complete my research and print it in a book form´, he claims.
Living a low profile life in his small studio, with three solo shows to his credit he narrates his art works in a very simple way, ´I paint what I see´, and considers them as a small segment of the life he lived as a practicing artist.
Published in Dawn, December 2nd, 2018
