ISLAMABAD: An exhibition opened at the Tanzara Art Gallery on Thursday, featuring the works of two acclaimed artists Ali Azmat and Mugheez Riaz.

Ali Azmat is one of the best known figurative artists in Pakistan. His work is bold in the colours that it uses and the statements that it makes. Philosophical ideas and political commentary are communicated in a language that is simple and unpretentious. In this serious of work, titled ‘ADAptability’, the artist presents works created in collaboration with his four year old daughter Ada.

The series features works in acrylic on canvas. Azmat’s signature female figures who are modest in their femininity rather than sexualized dominate the canvases with touches from Ada which create a whole new language. In one painting Azmat paints a woman with her back to the viewer, a starry sky above her, a cactus and flowers. Ada’s addition to this work is an orange house, butterflies and grass.

Together the story that father and daughter tell is at once layered with hope, beauty, imagination and solitude. In yet another piece, Azmat’s elegant feminine figure sits in a crisp white kameez against a background of messy strokes, stick figures, houses and the many symbols that can live inside the mind of an imaginative little girl. Azmat’s contained, detailed work makes a beautiful contrast against the unabashed confidence of his daughter’s strokes.

“This series of work is unique in my own art practice. A lot was learnt and lots more can be explored and experimented. Apart from my work, my understanding of the words like tolerance, patience and ‘ADAptability’ have broadened,” explained the painter, who is exhibiting in Islamabad for the first time.

As beautiful and accomplished Mughees Riaz’s paintings are, they are very familiar and at times do come across as monotonous. Landscapes are central in the art of Mugheez Riaz. He has the skill of putting life in any animate or inanimate object he creates.

His Ravi riverscape is serene and poised and in creating them the artist takes his inspiration from a direct observation of nature. Nature is personal and abstract to Mughees Riaz. “The strange dawns and sunsets, water, changing colours, the sky spreading alone without support, the beginning of a new day, with light converting into dark and the night transferring into day light, there is a deep pathos, hidden in all this,” said the landscape painter explaining how every picture is an expression of unwanted pain and unknown happiness.

“They invite a mood of pure contemplation through the viewer; they are works of significant skill and attractive aesthetic beauty,” said the curator of the show Noshi Qadir on the opening day.

“Ali Azmat and Mugheez Riaz both enjoy local as well as international recognition. Their works have been extensively exhibited at home and abroad and are in public and private collections worldwide.”

One of the guests described a small scale painting by Mughees Riaz more atmospheric. “I like the large scale works too. But the small scale of this work draws you in. The scale is powerful and sensitive,” said Sheherbano Hussain who is painter herself.

Similarly she liked the juxtaposition of flatter surfaces and more stylized brush rendering in the figurative works by Ali Azmat. “The blend creates an interesting pictorial tension,” said Sheherbano Hussain.

Another visitor, Ashraf Qazi found the women in paintings by Ali Azmat sad. “That’s the way they are. There is too much sadness and loneliness. The colours are beautiful though,” said Ashraf Qazi.

The show will run till December, 8.

Published in Dawn, November 28th, 2014