High Praise Comes to Pakistan's Artistic Community
Thu, September 3, 2009 Updated on 12-23-09, based on reader interest. Thank you.
The power of art to communicate messages and meaning to us is sometimes transformational and also personal.
“High Rise: Lake City Drive” by Huma Mulji.Randy Kennedy writes for the NYTimes that Pakistan artist Huma Mulji’s water buffalo posed atop a pedestal is a “comically eerie sculpture”, now housed in New York’s Asia Society art exhibit “Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan”, opening next Thursday Sept. 10th.
I look at the image and see a profound juncture in the evolution of people, cultures, civilizations, values, everyday reality and assumptions about greatness. The concept of secularization is widely rejected, especially by radical Islam.
For me, “High Rise: Lake City Drive” by Huma Muji echoes many of the issues we write about, here at Anne of Carversville.
I try to acknowledge the failings of Western civilization and its negative impacts on cultures, while also embracing it — compared to alternatives like radical Islam and the blowing up of all art, veiling of women and life based on Taliban values.
Imran Qureshi| Hanging FireHow exciting that New York is home to the first major exhibition of 15 Pakistani artists, most associated with the National College of Arts in Lahore. The exhibition runs at New York’s Asia Society until Jan. 3, 2010. I’m contacting the National College of Arts Lahore, to see if the exhibition is traveling to another city. A
Hanging Fire (excellent video-A)
Returning to the exhibition’s website, while researching artists like Hamara Abbas, I realize that she — for one — would be stoned to death for her art. I will write a separate feature on Abbas, after looking further into her work.
The following video comes to mind today (Dec. 23, 2009) after reviewing the sculpture of Hamara Abbas. Hers become part of an emotional journal essay that I wrote, wrestling with the Lubna Hussein case and my own return to feminist activism, especially on the subject of female sexuality.
The Mythodea video sums up the contradictions that I see in “High Rise: Lake City Drive”, a work that affects me profoundly, when I even look at the photo.
When the Taliban blew up the ancient Buddas of Barnyan, I changed forever inside. I do regard our global situation as a battle of good and evil, although I readily admit the litany of faults that accompany Western civilization and wish we spent more aid money on development, instead of drones.
(I just returned again, remembering a violent ‘discussion’ between myself and an Arab man about the damage we’ve inflicted in Iraq, including on historic treasures. America’s hands are dirty, too, as I’ve acknowledged.)
Drawing a Line in Lubna’s Sand, Saying ‘No More’ to the Growing, Global Erosion of Women’s Rights in the Name of Any Man’s Religion.
Vangelis - Mythodea - for the NASA Mission Mars Odyssey 2001
Young Women in Pakistan
On a sad and concerned note, we have yet another school for girls destroyed this week in Pakistan. Trying to better inform myself about the issues, I understand the facts of many young women, even in Islamabad, becoming believers of radical Islam.
Today is the first time I understand how serious the problems are in Islamabad and not only in Peshawar or the NWFP.
Pakistan’s Girls: Uneducated, Radicalized & Anti-West
Two very popular AC articles that illuminate my thinking and have been translated into Arabic are:
Beyond the Veil: The Intersection of Sensuality, Culturally Appropriate & Women’s Rights
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