Amna Ilyas, young sculptor and installation maker, has questioned potential viewers with the following discourse; “Those who count themselves among the faithful: what have they found, and those looking for something new: what do they aspire for? Does a shared vision of a Paradise on Earth unite them? Do they share a common dilemma of the intractableness of this place, while they search for their salvation in different vanishing points? What does God offer them? What has happened to God in a world in which the disillusioned abandon him, others know only to defend him with violence, and yet others turn away in anguish and horror, and consume, but still disregard, the images of religiously motivated violence that have become commonplace? To be an artist, to live out of commitment to art, does this not also mean to be a practicing monk, to operate with the goal of giving new meaning to one’s own life and those of others? Does art know the answer to the question? Or is it too dark to enter…?

These questions were important and therefore shared here in their entirety. They formed the psychological backdrop to the stark, huge, yet minimalistic creations that greeted viewers who entered into the Rohtas gallery in Lahore, at Ilyas’s exhibition, titled, ‘Immediacy’. Engulfed in smoke, the gallery presented a menacing picture at the inaugural day, and viewers could see a pitch black, life-sized, six feet by six feet cubical at the entrance space and another same sized, white and illuminated cubicle in the background. These were actually like two rooms within a room, and presented themselves as rather stunning and enigmatic entities. The black cubical, reminiscent of Kaaba—minus its embellishments—had a small door at one end, and one could actually enter this space. But it was pitch dark inside, and most viewers were reluctant to enter it.

The lighted cubical had a door, but this was sealed and therefore made the space inside out of bounds. The artist had made innumerable large scratches on the white fiberglass walls. These appeared to indicate that people had wanted to see what was inside. A few scratches were like tiny cuts and anyone curious enough to decipher them could peep through to get a glimpse of what was inside the illuminated cubicle. Other than a light bulb one could discern something hanging from the roof; a composition of calligraphic cut-outs in subtly coloured earth tones.

Obviously, the exhibition was anything but conventional, and succeeded in jolting viewers though its bold and strong statement. As a young NCA graduate of 2003, who now teaches sculpture at her alma mater, Ilyas belongs to the generation of artists who have witnessed the stark realities of violence perpetrated in the name of religion. For many such artists, there is no time to waste on niceties; there are painful questions that need to be answered, and damning realities that beckon one to take action. It is in this context that Ilyas has gone through the trouble of creating such weighty installations, both in terms of their physical entity, and the questions they ask. But then, as Ilyas herself has asked, “Does art know the answer to the question?” A tough question indeed, but nonetheless one that disallows complacency.