A Question of Knowledge

A Question of Knowledge Tim Smith-Laing talks to Rasheed Araeen about six decades of art making, writing and publishing 104 105 Born in pre-partition Pakistan in 1935, as Iqbal and literary writers like Saadat Rasheed Araeen is a London-based artist who Hasan Manto, as well as films – at first is now recognized as one of the most impor- Previous page left mostly from Bollywood but, in the early tant voices in postwar British art. Growing In the Midst of Darkness I, 1950s, Hollywood and European movies up in Karachi, he trained as a civil engineer 2012–13, emulsion on canvas, arrived. The educated class dressed like 1.1 × 1.4 m before moving to Paris and then London, in Westerners and there was a community 1964, to pursue a career as a painter. Shifting Previous page right of Parsis and Catholics who spoke English Summer Blue, his energies towards sculpture, he became 1985–2014, paint on wood, all the time. a pioneer of minimalist and participatory art, 77 × 56 × 15 cm TSL In keeping with Karachi’s technological before expanding his practice to incorpo- modernity, you trained as a civil 1 rate land art, performance, photography and 7b, 1962, engineer. At what point did the idea of mixed-media pieces that sought to challenge felt pen on paper, art begin to take over? 29 × 40 cm the racism of the British art world. His work, RA In the late 1950s. The first works that led which can be found in significant collections 2 me to believe I could do something signif- across the world, will be honoured in a major Burning Bicycle Tyres, icant were Dancing Bodies (1959–61), My 1959, photographic prints on paper, touring retrospective in 2017, beginning at each: 46 × 61 cm First Sculpture (1959) and Burning Bicycle Eindhoven’s Van Abbemuseum. Tyres (1959). I was walking home and saw Courtesy Also a curator and theorist, Araeen has previous pages & 1 the artist a twisted piece of metal lying in the street. long been an essential voice in critical engage- and Grosvenor Gallery, London • I took it home, cleaned it and put it on the ments with race and art. In addition to 2 the artist and Aicon Gallery, table. My mother walked in and asked: curating the influential exhibitions ‘Essential New York ‘What is this dirty thing?’ I said: ‘This Black Art’ (Chisenhale Gallery, London, 1988) is a sculpture.’ And that’s how I made and ‘The Other Story: Afro-Asian Artists in My First Sculpture. Both these works are Postwar Britain’ (Hayward Gallery, London, understand the full significance of art related to a piece I had already begun 1989), he founded the critical journals Black as a profession. to develop in 1959, whose curvilinear Phoenix (1978–79) and Third Text (1987– TSL Was that through exposure to art in form was unique not only in the context ongoing). He has also written about his own museums in Karachi? of art in Pakistan but also mainstream artistic journey in Making Myself Visible RA There were no art museums in Karachi at modernism: a kind of double helix. Their (1984) and Art Beyond Art: Ecoaesthetics: that time. It was because I came across the relationship is, however, very complex, A Manifesto for the 21st Century (2010). work of people who were called ‘artists’. conceptually. I have written about them I met Araeen, a generous and hospitable My first encounter with a professional art- in detail in my book Art Beyond Art. interviewee, at his studio in north London to ist was in 1950, when I met S.M. Sultan; TSL In 1964, you decided to move to Paris. discuss the different facets of his past, present he made me understand that art wasn’t What took you there? and future. only copying. Until then, all I did was RA I was unhappy about the art being made make copies, or draw portraits of famous in Karachi, which was mainly deriva- TIM SMITH-LAING people, such as the founder of Pakistan, tive of Western art. I knew I wanted to How did you first become interested in art? Mohammed Ali Jinnah, and poets like pursue something different. I had a show RASHEED ARAEEN Muhammad Iqbal. I became aware of in 1963 at the Arts Council of Pakistan When I was about seven years old, living modernity, particularly the work of Frank Gallery in Karachi, which was a complete in a small town in Balochistan, around Lloyd Wright, by browsing through failure. So, I decided I should move to 100 kilometres from Karachi, my mother books at the United States Information Europe; Paris was my romantic dream. asked me to help her draw flowers Service Library; I realized that modern- TSL How long did you stay there? on a sheet of linen so that she could ism represented the progress we badly RA One month. I hadn’t learned French and embroider it. That, for me, was the needed in Pakistan. Cultural modernity I didn’t have the financial resources to beginning of my interest in art. It wasn’t came with Western culture, but also in sustain myself. Also, I didn’t see any- until the mid-1950s that I began to the form of Urdu literature, via poets such thing impressive: the galleries were full of American pop art. A friend in London said: ‘Come to London, you could get a job.’ I have been living here ever since. TSL But you made moves to establish yourself in the art world in London? RA I brought eight paintings with me, in the hope that I would forge a career. The Village was an arts club owned, I think, by the opera singer Peter Pears – the boyfriend of the composer Benjamin Britten. They had a foyer in which they occasionally exhibited paintings. The first time I went there, they were showing the work of Francis Souza. They offered me an exhibition at the end of 1965; but I became so preoccupied with the idea of modern sculpture that I thought showing my painting might distract me from my new interest. So, I cancelled it; I only exhibited these paintings for the first time in Sharjah in 2014. TSL You had started working again as an engineer by then. Did the economic freedom of having a job facilitate your commitment to doing what you 1 wanted as an artist? 106 FRIEZE NO. 183 NOVEMBER • DECEMBER 2016 2 RA I don’t know if I would put it that way. four cubes and, when I tried to put them ‘I saw a twisted piece of Although, with hindsight, I think it together, I discovered that I could make helped me to understand what the sculp- more than one arrangement. With this metal lying in the street. tor Anthony Caro was doing: he was also came the realization that if you break the a trained engineer, and he was picking up rigidity of fixed symmetrical structure, it I took it home, cleaned fragments from engineering and putting could lead to a movement towards infinity. it and put it on the table. them together to make sculpture. And so I developed the idea of public par- TSL And it was through engineering ticipation: I would provide the public with that you found your own minimalist a symmetrical structure that they could My mother walked in sculptural idiom. dismantle and rearrange as they wished. RA Yes, with Sculpture No. 1 and Sculpture TSL In a March 2008 interview with and asked: “What is this No. 2 (both conceived in 1965). Richard Dyer, in Wasafiri, you described TSL Your other landmark work from Zero to Infinity’s participatory nature dirty thing?” I said: this time is your interactive sculpture, as being ‘allegorical’ of ‘human equality Zero to Infinity (1968), a 2003 and collectivity’. Does it mark the point “This is a sculpture”.’ version of which is now in the where political concerns surface in Tate collection. Were you aware of your work? RASHEED ARAEEN people like Groupe de Recherche RA I was always involved in political activity, d’Art Visuel, who were experimenting but I kept it separate from art. In 1967, with participatory sculpture and I was part of the group that campaigned performances at the same time? against the Greek junta and the Vietnam RA I had some idea. I came to know War, but I didn’t see a connection between something about them through politics and art. I thought art was art and Signals Gallery in London, which was its function was to be beautiful. run by David Medalla. From 1965, TSL In the early 1970s, however, you joined I became preoccupied with geometry the Black Panthers and Artists for and symmetry in sculpture. In 1968, Democracy and your work became I was constructing a work comprised of directly concerned with race and FRIEZE NO. 183 NOVEMBER • DECEMBER 2016 107 racism. In 1973, you exhibited For writing was also conceived as an artwork: Oluwale, a semi-documentary piece I call it textual art. about the Nigerian immigrant David TSL As a curator and art historian, Oluwale, who drowned in 1969 after you’ve also been fighting to re-insert being systematically harassed by Leeds significant Afro-Asian artists into art City police. Why did the division history. After ‘Essential Black Art’, between politics and art crumble you went on to curate ‘The Other for you? Story: Afro-Asian Artists in Postwar 1 & 2 Black Phoenix Nos. 3 & 2, RA I read about Oluwale’s death in 1971, and Britain’ at the Hayward Gallery 1978–79 it shocked and moved me so much that (1989), which grouped together artists I decided to do a work dedicated to him.

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