Unlike art forms that adorn walls, domestic or public spaces henna application is a cosmetic art meant to beautify the body. Exotic or ubiquitous, steeped in tradition or a trendy fashionista accessory henna painting is a delightful woman centric art ritual whose ante has been upped in the current designer sensibility craze.

The post-modern obsession with pop culture has given this ancient practice a new visibility thanks to western fashion pioneers like Catherine Zeta Jones, Naomi Campbell, Demi Moore and Xena. Madonna's henna tattooed hands in her video for Frozen also spawned a great deal of promotion on television and in glossy magazines. Similarly the singer's sinuously posed, henna painted hand and wrist in the eye-catching print ad for a line of fine watches 'Madonna and her 1911' has catapulted the art decor genre into high fashion territory.

Although ethnic communities residing in the West have always practiced the art of henna, the acceptance of this form by westerners, especially celebrities, is a relatively new phenomenon. It is interesting to note that innovation in henna art is taking place in western societies where it has no traditional roots rather than in the countries of its origin where its existence is supported by rich historical references.

In these regions its usage is still confined to customary time honoured practices and conventional painting of bridal and festival/ritual category is centred largely on hand and feet application. But among western patrons it has become a body art where any area of the human figure can be artfully patterned in order to exoticise it.

Tattoo oriented henna painting in the West is popularly called 'temporary tattoo'. People, who are reluctant to acquire a real tattoo, test out a location and design by first having an ephemeral henna version of what will eventually become a permanent part of their skin. The practice of wearing henna as jewellery is again a western attribute also.

Like tattoo, henna designs in the US resemble “tribal” bracelets and anklets, belts and rings.

There is a demand for Japanese and Chinese Art symbols in henna especially the yin yang sign and all its variations. Celtic Art has beautiful intricate knots and animal designs that are more complicated to do in henna but are being mastered. Celtic designs are very spiritual and magical and have many deep meanings to Anglo Saxons.

As an appendage of fashion design henna art falls in the category of applied arts - but today the divisions between the arts are being blurred. New age art conforms to the mantra of post modernism which believes in eradicating the boundaries between high and low arts, of working in new media and of radically reinventing tradition. In this scenario the use of henna in contemporary art is full of possibilities but so far Naiza Khan is perhaps the only artist here who has experimented with the organic pigment to articulate her views.

A recurring issue in Naiza Khan's works is the society's view on the female body in Muslim cultures as well as in the western context. In her 'Henna hands' series she constructed life-size female figures with henna pigment patterns applied directly to the gallery wall through stencils or templates. In an attempt to relocate the 'Henna hands' out of the gallery and studio enclosures she worked in public spaces in different locations near the Cantonment Station and railway Colony in Karachi where a non art audience would interact with the figures. She finally chose the walls of a lower middle class 'mohalla'— a community of Parsis, Muslims, Christians and Hindus in the hope that differences in cultural values would be reflected in the act of seeing and understanding.

The engagement between the henna stenciled figural art and popular audience was needless to say an uneasy one. In the 'Dhobi' site the implied march of the three women was all but scratched out from the walls soon after it was made. In another location children found the henna forms funny but the women were angered by the blatant use of the female figure and argued that it should be replaced by a man's body.

Gradually images in other sites were also tampered with, removed, partially erased or dismembered. The rehabilitation of the altered images found a new abode in another gallery showing where they were transformed again through interaction with yet another audience. A photographic record of the event documents the process of dislocation and relocation which the artist initiates in order to explore perception levels of audiences regarding the female presence in society. This was a concept driven exercise where henna was used symbolically to reinforce the womanly presence and as such was far removed from the 'decorative accessory' status of henna.