KB17 KARACHI BIENNALE CATALOGUE OCT 22 – NOV 5, 2017 KB17 Karachi Biennale Catalogue First published in Pakistan in 2019 by KBT in association with Markings Publishing KB17 Catalogue Committee Niilofur Farrukh, Chair John McCarry Amin Gulgee Aquila Ismail Catalogue Team Umme Hani Imani, Editor Rabia Saeed Akhtar, Assistant Editor Mahwish Rizvi, Design and Layouts Tuba Arshad, Cover Design Raisa Vayani, Coordination with Publishers Keith Pinto, Photo Editor Halima Sadia, KB17 Campaign Design and Guidelines (Eye-Element on Cover) Photography Credits Humayun Memon, Artists’ Works, Performances, and Venues Ali Khurshid, Artists’ Works and Performances Danish Khan, Artists’ Works and Events Jamal Ashiqain, Artists’ Works and Events Qamar Bana, Workshops and Venues Samra Zamir, Venues and Events ©All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means graphic, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording, taping or information storage and retrieval system - without written permission of Karachi Biennale Trust ISBN Printed by Le Topical [email protected] [email protected] www.markings.com.pk Claremont House FOREWORD Sitaron say agay jehan aur bhi hain Abhi Ishaq kay imtehan aur bhi hain Many new worlds lie beyond the stars And many more challenges for the passionate and the spirited Allama Iqbal Artists with insight and passion have always re- by the state, have begun to shrink and many imagined the world to inspire fresh beginnings with turning points in Pakistan’s art remain uncelebrated hope. Sadequain communicated through public as they are absent from the national cultural murals, Bashir Mirza furthered the discourse with discourse. Karachi boasts of one of the biggest the first art magazine, and Rabia Zuberi founded commercial gallery scenes in South Asia, after the longest running art school. They, and other Delhi and Mumbai. Over the years, however, these stalwarts of Modernism, like Zubeida Agha, Ismail galleries have become the only space available to Gulgee, Ali Imam, Anna Molka Ahmed, Shakir Ali, professional artists. This imbalance has exacerbated and Zainul Abedin, offered a cultural vision to the the commodification of art and diminished its role people of a young country learning to be a nation. in the cultural consciousness of a people. Among Pakistan’s art movements, the Neo-Miniature A commitment to connect art, the city, and Movement is perhaps the most internationally its people led to the founding of the Karachi recognised, but other unsung, locally-born art Biennale Trust (KBT) in 2016. The Biennale was movements have been equally influential in the premised on addressing local concerns and global local context. The Watercolour Movement from aspirations, taking its cue from the renowned the Karachi School of Art, under the mentorship of curator, Enwesor Okwui’s empowering words, ‘you Mansur Rahi, and Resistance Art that, even without can make the Biennale whatever you want it to a manifesto, came to express solidarity against a be.’ KBT responded with an ambitious vision to repressive regime in the 1980s, and post-2000, have intervene with art, in order to engender optimistic continued to complicate narratives of social and discourse about rehabilitating the cultural identity religious extremism. Pakistan’s Feminist Art, with its of a city eclipsed by three decades of tumultuous manifesto signed by 15 women artists in Lahore, violence and offer the world an alternative lens to has persisted on a trajectory of resilience. Popular this ostensibly beleaguered city. In October 2017, Art that emerged in the 1990s, offering its lens to KB17 successfully showcased over 180 artists from daily pursuits in the city’s bazaars and streets, has Pakistan and 5 continents across the globe in the marked a new inclusivity. Subsequent decades have largest international assembly of art in Pakistan. thus seen widening art engagement and collapsing distinctions between art that was once subsumed This first Biennale in Karachi engaged with the city within ‘high culture’ and that which, it might be at multiple levels, recognising, in its early stages, the argued, was injudiciously dismissed as ‘popular’ or need to step in and connect with audiences from ‘mainstream.’ a spectrum of neighbourhoods and communities. In the year preceding the Biennale, the ‘Reel on Powerful works seldom get a chance to reach the Hai’ project installed dozens of public art works, people since public art spaces, which are controlled crafted from recycled cable reels in hospitals, parks, places of worship, schools, and universities inspired by Gerardo Mosquera’s claim that the to initiate a dialogue about public art within the ‘zones of silence’ that exist between countries environs of the reel sites and in the media. Since of, what is politically termed, ‘the global South’ Pakistan’s population is largely in its teens, including continue to prevent a free flow of ideas. To young voices in the conversation took priority. counter this separation, it was decided that KBT Our emerging artists initiative and educational will, in each iteration of the Biennale, exhibit art programmes helped young artists and students and explore thinkers from a different region, which explore the transformative power of art, with its negotiates comparable histories of colonial or neo- potential to spark creative solutions in classrooms colonial intervention. Latin America became the and help young people, who have grown up in a focus of KB17, where the works of 9 artists from fractured city, narrow ruptures and rally for change. the region were exhibited, and a study circle, which read, discussed, and critically examined texts on the By creating new memories of invigorating and works of cultural visionaries from Latin America, provocative art, KB17 successfully took some met fortnightly. Taking it further, art critics from steps toward reclaiming the history of the city’s Cuba, Paraguay, and Puerto Rico were invited to historical core on MA Jinnah Road, particularly present on contemporary practices in the region at two important institutions: NJV School, which that address the thematic WITNESS, examine was built in 1852 and housed the first National legacies of colonialism, and scrutinise autocratic Assembly of Pakistan, and the century old, Jamshed regimes. They collectively highlighted the valence Memorial Hall of the Theosophical Society, with its of witnessing as a means of responding to shared unsurpassed contributions to interfaith dialogue in experiences of epistemological control. a land where the followers of over six religions live in close proximity. Contemporary Artists all over the world are seen negotiating experience and memory in an era full As an art critic and an art historian, it has been of disorder, anxiety, and contradiction; the thinker, important for me to introduce a forum for robust Ziauddin Sardar, calls these ‘postnormal times.’ KB17 discourse and documentation in the field of invited audiences and artists to share a platform cultural knowledge as an institution undergirding to imagine a world beyond ‘postnormal times.’ the Biennale. The Critical Knowledge Lab (CKL), Its exhibitions acted as a temporary museum of which I hope will develop into an interdisciplinary testimonies across the city, where the visitor could incubator for ideas, where an open exchange on hold reflective conversations, find stimulation in a contemporary concerns will persist and evolve, diversity of perspectives, and feel provoked to ask and where voices from disparate backgrounds and pressing questions. ages will converge, sometimes even coalesce, is a realisation of that interest. The interface created by KB17 kindled the beginning of a new relationship between art and the public For the Biennale’s first instalment, the CKL focused audience, as a quantum of paintings, installations, on five interdisciplinary roundtables that explored video art, and performative works entered their the experimental space around ideas common to cultural imagination. artists, social activists, writers, musicians, and urban interventionists, leading up to the main event. I began by quoting the national poet, Allama Iqbal, Comprehensive records of these discussions, who alludes to a new world awaiting discovery. I available in this catalogue and on our website, maintain that this first journey will indeed hinge on can serve as a vital resource for students and inward reflections, guided by the maps that poets, researchers of art and art history. writers, and artists create for society. Another component of the Discursive Programme Niilofur Farrukh was The South-South Critical Dialogue, which was CEO KB17, Managing Trustee KBT INTRODUCTION - WITNESS When confronted by the theme for the Karachi of whom brought a young perspective and energy Biennale 2017 (KB17) – Witness – the much- to our endeavour. Curator-at-Large, Zarmeene quoted Chinese curse, “May you live in interesting Shah, operated in an invaluable advisory capacity. times” comes to mind. These are indisputably 20-year-old Adam Fahy-Majeed, who grew up in interesting times not only for my city but also Australia, brought another view to our curatorial for the world around us. We are often told as process. My entire team, including myself, worked artists that our duty is to question the times we on a voluntary basis. live in. If so, even this seemingly familiar “Chinese” proverb demands scrutiny. Fred R. Shapiro, editor Coming from the perspective of an artist- of the Yale Book of Quotations, noted, “No authentic curator, I am wary of the tremendous power and Chinese saying to this effect has ever been found.” responsibility that the title “curator” bestows. For The British politician Sir Austen Chamberlain first KB17, I approached artists whom we commissioned conjured up this expression in a speech in 1936, as with a single word: Witness. My team and I then reported by the Yorkshire Evening Post. worked with each artist over a period of a year to clarify their respective visions. The idea was to get We all bear witness to our times and ourselves, a kaleidoscopic view of what this thematic meant both in the present and the past.