KARACHI: In art and literature, the symbolic representation of the colour green has been marked by its delicious multiplicity. The first thing that comes to mind while discussing ‘green’ is fertility in terms of landscape and organic growth. This suggests positivity. But then there is this oft-quoted line uttered by Iago from Shakespeare’s play Othello: “O beware, my lord, of jealousy; it is the green-eyed monster which doth mock the meat it feeds on.” Now the extremely negative trait of jealousy is also in the mix. An exhibition of multidisciplinary miniaturist Wardha Shabbir’s artworks titled Green Matter, which is under way at the Canvas Art Gallery, does not touch upon these extremes. It is a rather focused effort with respect to content and delightful in its employment of technique.

So, what is its content? The artist’s statement says, “The foliage, forming relations with points and lines, engages and disengages with the surface to formulate ‘organic geometry’ expressing a perceptual journey. With provocative elements of my subjective experience, I create an interactive imagery that unveils itself gradually to the observer’s eye, stimulating their senses at first and finally reaching them through their own ‘visual vocabulary’. I aim to incite a thought-provoking process of demystification through the rendering of hauntingly beautiful visuals that persist in the mind… Through this artistic pursuit, I pay a collective homage to the struggle that is quintessential to women’s lives.”

This makes the display pretty interesting because Shabbir is trying to achieve something extraordinary here: confluence of nature in its pristine form and the “vitality of feminine emotion” with symbols of “hope and survival”. Therefore the artist is speaking of optimism that generates from the inner strength of living beings, especially those for whom ‘struggle’, until now, had become a norm and not an aberration. And the finesse with which Shabbir uses lines and strokes, along with the lovely use of the aforementioned colour, makes her message embedded in artworks such as ‘The Parent Garden’ and ‘Flecked with Stars’ (gouache on acid free paper) more than convincing.

The show concludes on July 24.

Published in Dawn, July 21st, 2021