Folding Shadows opens at Koel
KARACHI: A three-person show titled Folding Shadows opened at the Koel Art Gallery on Wednesday. The participating artists are Sarah Ahmed, Babar Gull and Hadia Moiz.
The shadows mentioned in the name of the exhibition remind one of the Greek philosopher Plato’s opinion on poetry being ‘shadow of shadows’. He was basically talking about art as a form imitation, to which Aristotle famously responded in his thesis Poetics that art imitates the ideal reality which could be found in everything. This also seems to be the crux of the three-person display.
Gull’s ‘Thirsty Crow’ (Sumi ink on wasli) is a potent example of the observation. The crow has been represented in art and literature with a variety of meanings. The fable of the thirsty crow (also referred to in the exhibition by virtue of another artwork) in our part of the world is known to everyone. But with the eminent English poet Ted Hughes, the crow assumed an unusual significance — the words struggle and survival come to mind. Gull’s storytelling, rather impressively, moves along those lines.