EXHIBITION: URBAN NARRATIVES
Despite the love-hate relationships that the city inspires in its citizens, Karachi remains a topic of interest for a large number of artists. Naiza Khan is one such artist, taking her practice through a dramatic shift from exploring the female experience through studies of the body to traversing the urban expanse of Karachi, particularly its outlying areas. Her work investigates the intersection of the geographies, histories, ecology and politics connectd to the area, interpreting it through a subjective context presented by a multiplicity of visual language.
Khan’s latest show at the Koel Gallery brings together some older works presented in conjunction with new works to highlight certain key aspects of her practice. The internationally acclaimed artist divides her time between London and Karachi, which has only broadened her concerns to a more global perspective while remaining deeply rooted in the complexities of Karachi and its relationship with the ocean. Khan’s work explores an interest in the nature of objects and how these objects are transformed through the ocean in their movement through time and space.
This is translated by the artist by looking at the Dutch East India Company and the history of its trade in the region, using the image of the Kraak porcelain as a metaphor. These series of screen prints use the image of the Dutch Delft pottery along with renderings of shipwrecks, the whale form, seashells and other sea-based visual motifs to comment on its movement from China to other parts of the world, in turn acquiring a certain cultural identity. It makes one think about the strategic importance of the seas in the context of world economy and politics and our own place within it.
Naiza Khan investigates the urban expanse of Karachi while remaining rooted in the city’s complexities
The artist looks at the city through a historical lens, conversing with old Company paintings of factories in Calcutta during the British Raj. Works such as ‘The Map is Elsewhere I & II’, ‘Breakage, Re-aligned’ and the ‘Cast of a City’ series seem to contemplate the demarcation of land, and how the maps laid out by the British for cities like Karachi still remain buried beneath layers of newer maps that are superimposed over the years.
“I’m playing with this idea of looking at certain kinds of historical mappings, thinking about contemporary experience of the city,” says the artist. This layering is reflected in her process as well, as she creates forms by pasting and removing stencil tape in between layers of paint. These are not literal readings or reactions to those paintings, but contemplative and abstracted ones, speaking of the erosion of past experiences and their unrelenting influence on the present.