A round up of some of our favourite art shows up in Lahore this March.
Home
Imran Qureshi
on till 30th June 2024
The exhibition pays homage to the city of Lahore and examines the idea of a home. COMO Museum was originally designed as a residential house in the 1980s—Qureshi sets out to reimagine and reinvigorate it as a home space. ‘Home’ features murals, installations, video and photography that are a signatures of Qureshi’s practice.
Earlier this month, Qureshi opened his solo show ‘The Garden’ at Nasir Bagh in Lahore, which is designed around the idea of a garden. Both these shows will run in parallel.
The artist describes the two exhibitions as a philosophical diptych creating a thought provoking dialogue about the concepts of home and garden. Ultimately, they serve as an ode to the artist’s connection with the city of Lahore.
Who will hold you now?
Ayesha Jatoi
on till 30th March, 2024
Ayesha Jatoi’s recent work comes in reaction to the ongoing suffering in Gaza. The title of the show refers to the 20,000+ children orphaned as a result Israel’s onslaught of indiscriminate violence and genocide. This text piece weaves its way through the gallery and connects to the lamentful thumri sung by Zainub J. Khawaja— ‘mora piya, ghar aaa’.
The show also features conceptual miniature paintings; miniature paintings were a part of historical manuscripts, recording chronicles of the rulers and significant events. Jatoi feels that artists today also have a duty to record our times. In the show she shares some of her conceptual, minimalist miniature studies to give an opening to how she has been deconstructing and unpacking the originals until they are often reduced to very sparse lines and text—which is often ignored, but was an integral part of the historic illuminated manuscript.
Jatoi is also showing landscapes that are abstracted and laid bare on two dimensional surfaces. These various strands of history, memory, home and longing come together full circle in the 2024 text piece ‘Motherland’.
mathematics of composing pretences
A four-person group show
on till 7th March, 2024
This marks the first major exhibition at Kaleido Kontemporary featuring works from four artists—Ali Arshad, Ayaz Jokhio, Mahreen Zuberi and Maryam Irfan. This exhibition lays emphasis on the pertinence of nature and borrows concepts of dualism and the human urge to represent and materialise nature through tangible medium(s).
Clockwise from top left: 500 square yards (3) by Mahreen Zuberi; Littered Landscape (Kot Diji) by Ayaz Jokhio; Subha by Maryam Irfan; not all moons do the boogie woogie by Ali Arshad—photos courtesy of the gallery.
The constantly evolving geo-social landscape offers a wide range of tools and platforms for artists to experiment with and express their ideas, creating an environment where both nature and nurture are integral to an artist’s growth and development in prevailing ecologies.
The Viewing, The Viewer and The Viewed
Hooria Khan
on till 5th March, 2024
Inspired by the timeless wisdom of poets such as Rumi and Saadi and the allegorical language of traditional miniature art, Khan has endeavoured to construct a narrative that invites contemplation of the multifaceted nature of human existence.
Khan invites the viewer to contemplate the consequences of unchecked power, envisioning a world where humanity’s impulses are confronted with compassion and understanding. Like a bird tracing across the endless expanse of sky, she endeavours to question the essence of liberty—are we truly unbound, or are we ensnared by the invisible threads of expectation, conformity and limitations of our earthly cages?
The text for this round up is based on official press releases and gallery catalogues.