KARACHI: The second Nigaah Art Awards were held at the Mohatta Palace Museum on Saturday evening. The award-giving ceremony was interspersed with musical performances, dances and a live painting session in which Saeed Qureshi made an artwork standing to the right side of the musicians who entertained the audience with a sitar bandish.

The following artists won the award: Shibli Muneer (contemporary painting), Mughees Riaz (landscape), Ali Kazim (figurative/portrait), Atif Khan (printmaking), Saba Qizalbash (drawing), Affan Baghpati (3D sculpture), Shah Abdullah Alamee (calligraphy), Irfan Ahmed Qureshi (traditional khattati), Zohreen Murtaza (art criticism), M R Javed (V M Art Gallery emerging artist, male), Rabia S Akhtar (female), Syeda Unab Sumbul (female), Akram Spaul (Art Kaam, still life), Adeel Uz Zafar (curatorial work), Humayun Memon (photography) and Waseem Ahmed (miniature).

Three lifetime achievement awards were also given on the occasion to Ahmed Khan, Mansoor Rahi and Saeed Akhtar.

In his introductory speech, Tauqeer Muhajir said there’s been a big gap between the first and second iterations of the event. When the last awards were held the economic conditions were much better.

2nd Nigaah Art Awards held

“While we confront the economic situation which has also impacted the art business, there are also many positives that have happened between the two Nigaah awards. Some of our performing artists and painters have done exceedingly well on the global stage. Arooj Aftab became the first Pakistani musician to get a Grammy. Ali Sethi and Shae Gill’s ‘Pasoori’is one of the biggest hits globally for 2022. Ms Marvel had a grand debut. Joyland and The Legend of Maula Jatt created waves globally.

“And our artists from the art fraternity have also done extremely well, from Shazia Sikandar to Salman Toor, from Waqas to Rashid Rana, and numerous others, have created work to international acclaim and are now part of art collections around the world.

“While there has been an economic meltdown, it might also be a good idea for Pakistan’s investment houses to develop a framework to launch a couple of art funds,” he said.

Discussion on 75 years of Pakistani art

Next up was a conversation between eminent artist Prof Salima Hashmi and the CEO of the Dawn Media Group, Hameed Haroon, on ‘75 years of Pakistani art’.

The first question that Mr Haroon put to Ms Hashmi was about the difficult time between 1947 and 2022, and that was there a unity in Pakistani art. She replied: “We seem to think that artists are somehow separated from life. It’s not [like that]. The question of unity could be asked about Pakistan in general. What we have seen 1947 onwards, the work that we call Pakistani art mirrors life as we knew it and lived in 75 years.

“1947 was not something like one curtain dropped and another curtain was lifted. There were millions of people on the move leaving, coming… It was a time of terrible trauma for millions of people. It continued for a while. So, in that time was any art possible? When did people start thinking about making art? Was poetry happening? Was writing happening? I asked my father [Faiz Ahmed Faiz, the poet], ‘so much happened in 1947 and you wrote only one poem, Subh-i-Azadi’. He answered, ‘We couldn’t cope.’”

Ms Hashmi said people couldn’t cope, but look at the work of Chughtai at that time. “Can you imagine that he was living in the city of Lahore and what had happened in Lahore? You don’t get a hint of it in the work that he did during that time. That tells you about the ability of certain artists to live in their cocoon.”

At this point, Mr Haroon mentioned the names of Fayzee Rahimin who does not have any work pertaining to 1947. “Allah Bakhsh does have a painting in 1949 for partition.”

Ms Hashmi then took the name of Zainul Abideen from “the other wing of our country [East Pakistan]”.

“He was the figure of the same status as Chughtai. I think when we talk about 75 years we must realise there were breaks, things happened. The first era after the shock and the trauma was of, like writer Intizar Husain had said that ‘we’d write new literature for Pakistan’… it was the likes of Shakir Ali and Ahmed Pervaiz… For a new country, it’s going to be a new art,” she said.

Then the two went on to discuss the various phases, leading up to contemporary art upon which Ms Hashmi showered praise. It was an invaluable discussion which one hopes was recorded by the organisers.

In the end six paintings donated by renowned artists were auctioned proceeds of which were to go to student scholarships. Shanzay Sabzwari anchored the programme.

Published in Dawn, January 23th, 2023