A recent exhibition held in Karachi aimed to focus audiences’ attention on the increasingly pertinent issue of climate change and how it impacts vulnerable communities — particularly those living in Pakistan’s northern areas.

Held at the VM Art Gallery, ‘Glacial Movements and the Ghaib’ was an exhibition focused squarely on climate change. The exhibition was conducted by the Pak Khawateen Painting Club and Lumens Studios. It featured works by Amna Hashmi, Louise Beer, Melanie King, Rebecca Huxley, Saba Khan, Saulat Ajmal and Zohreen Murtaza.

‘Glacial Movements and the Ghaib’ explored the history and politics of various water bodies. It focused on how water flows, what bodies impede the flow of water and what bodies move along with it. Life lived high up in the mountains, close to the glaciers, is both beautiful and precarious. In many ways, that is the essence that the artists have tried to communicate through their works.

Hashmi’s section of the exhibition was a series of polaroids with notes scribbled on them. They were directions for those that may want to visit these places again and included notes on how the landscape provided passage for the rivers and the glaciers. It was like stepping back into time with the artist creating somewhat of a travelogue through her photographs.

An exhibition at the VM Art Gallery tried shedding light on how water affects all life around us and how it is impacted by climate change

Zooming out of Ajmal’s Harvest Moon, acrylic on canvas, one got the impression that it represented the figure of a woman, as seen from the back; her hair tied up in a messy bun and the nape of her neck visible from the side. But, the more you looked at it, the painting assumed the appearance of a picture put together by using multiple frames. One saw the harvest moon and the fields interwoven under it.

Beer’s single piece, a digital print called Turbulence, gave a microscopic view of what it must be like to be inside a glacier. There was a clear blue line in the middle of the painting that went all the way through, but it blended in well with the greens and greys above and below it.

King put up a series of prints, which included that of the Shishper glacier that is currently threatening surrounding villages with an impending GLOF (glacial lake outburst flood) disaster. She took these photographs when the Pak Khawateen Painting Club and Lumen Studios visited the sites of four glaciers — Passu, Shishper, Battura and Gulkin — prior to the exhibition. Her prints were in black and white and focused on the landscape in and around the glaciers.

Huxley’s section of the exhibition was a series of black and white photographs of snow-covered peaks, with the snow lying in complete contrast to the rocky terrain of the un-snowed landscape. At first glance, the photos appeared quite ordinary. But, upon closer inspection, the photographs slowly revealed the layers upon layers of the landscape in the picture.

The exhibition shed a light on the issue of climate change and how Pakistan’s northern areas are especially vulnerable to its impact. It also came across as a group of people coming together to share their experiences of their travels through various forms of visual storytelling.

‘Glacial Movements and the Ghaib’ was exhibited at the VM Art Gallery, Karachi from March 4-24, 2023

Published in Dawn, EOS, April 9th, 2023