Paintings to
Remember!
By Rafiq Ebrahim
Glen Ellyn IL
My visit to Karachi
last year left many memories. I experienced the
thrills of a ride in minibus and rickshaw; I saw
queer human behaviour on the streets of Karachi;
I saw abject poverty face to face; I was there when
some fanatic perverts killed so many people by blasting
a bomb in a mosque. And yet, the people I came across
never even had a frown on their face. All along
I saw smiling faces, eager to greet me heartily.
I wondered how they could look so cheerful when
there were myriad problems in their life at every
step. Perhaps it is their faith in Islam, in God.
The last few days, I preferred to stay at home and
reflect, having seen a lot of the country where
I had passed my childhood and my youth. But one
day my friend, Altaf, insisted that I go out with
him and see some exhibits that I would never forget.
“Are we going to some art gallery?”
I asked.
“Sort of, but it is in open air,” he
replied.
“I would like to see something indigenous,
completely local, unlike what I have been seeing
at the Chicago Institute of Art.”
“I promise, you won’t be disappointed,”
said Altaf, as we came out of the house and got
into his Datsun. Rush hour traffic seemed erratic
and totally unsystematic. Drivers and pedestrians
obviously didn’t believe in traffic rules,
making one wonder how anybody could drive or walk
and still live! My friend, however, maneuvered his
car dexterously, as we reached a kacha by-lane near
North Nazimabad. He stopped the car by the compound
of a shabby residential house. The compound wall
was low, but long. “Ah, look at these!”
he said pointing out at the red paan-stained patches
on the wall.
“Do you mean to say that you brought me here
in this scorching heat in your car without air-conditioning
to show me these doings of paan eaters?” I
yelled.
Waiving my protest aside, he said, “Now carefully
observe these pieces of art, and let your imagination
do some work.”
I couldn’t help bursting out in a peal of
laughter. Truly, Altaf always managed to find meanings
in things where others would find none.
I looked at the ghoulish spots on the wall. There
were about five or six in different sizes and forms.
“Let’s begin from the left,” he
said. “ This object appears in an unusual
juxtaposition, and seems to float majestically in
space. Highly imaginative and reflects the quality
of fantasy that must be present in the artist’s
mind.” To me, it was just an irregular rectangle
with a couple of curves at the bottom.
We moved to the second ‘painting’. “Here’s
an example of Cubism!” he said, pointing out
to a cluster of big red dots, interconnecting each
other with thin broken lines.
The third ‘artwork” seemed to delight
him a lot. “This is a two-dimensional flat
design, executed in a sketchy, cursory manner. Observe
the interplay between positive and negative areas
- those filed with colour and those left in white,
and see the symmetrical small dots.”
We moved on. “The result of the flow of creative
inspiration. Here are white, red and again white,
red triangles. The perspective is highly effective,
almost like a work of the famous Chagall,”
he said, authoritatively. I looked deep into this
unsanitary piece and could find nothing.
“Here’s a work of creative talent, bursting
with pictorial ideas,” he remarked as we turned
towards the right side of the wall. “ If you
have a sense to recognize art, you will definitely
be reminded of works of Degas, Seurat, Beckman or
Picasso after seeing all these exhibits.”
We came to the last exhibit. “ This delicate
little painting conveys the mood of a hot summer
day. Note the red hot ball of the Sun, giving out
luminous rays.”
I could take no more of this weird analysis. “Altaf,
will you stop appreciating this unsanitary, unsocial
and extremely unhealthy trait of our paan-eaters?”
Just as I had said this, a bulky, middle-aged man
with thick, curly gray hair passed by on a bicycle,
spraying an unpainted portion of the wall with his
red saliva.
“Ah,” said Altaf. “ Now we have
also seen an artist, almost of the caliber of Van
Gogh. It’s a beauty, a remarkable piece of
art, fresh from the artist’s mouth. Look at
the glistening patches as they reflect the sunrays
falling on them. It shows……”
I did not want to hear any more, so I got into the
car. As my friend got in, I said, “And what
about this huge mound of stinking rubbish and garbage
by the ‘artistic wall’? I presume you
will say that the old master Pablo Picasso lies
buried under, and comes out every night from his
grave to admire these paintings”
He laughed and suggested we go to some other places
where we could see more of this art.
“Can you take me to the offices of a Nazim
or a Councilor or any local government authority
RIGHT NOW,” I pleaded. - rafiq.ebrahim@gmail.com
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