KARACHI: “While working on this exhibition it was fun for me to watch grown-ups such as senior officers of the State Bank of Pakistan come up and behave like excited kids. ‘Oh I remember this one from my childhood,’ I would hear them say as they had a story to narrate about the different coins they connected with,” smiled Abdul Jabbar Gull, the artist behind the special Art in Coinage exhibition, which opened at the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) Museum here on the occasion of Pakistan Day.

“Our young generation doesn’t even know about 99 per cent of these coins,” said the artist, adding that he wanted to show the beautiful coins to the young generation. “Before 1971, there were some coins that are also in the Bangla script,” he said.

The exhibition, which will remain open for two months, is a documentation of history of the State Bank through coins. There are 25 coins that have been replicated on actual scale using wood by Gull and put up on a panel of 3ft by 3ft. The surface of the coins has been treated with metallic paints and then lacquered.

Gull has previously also done the huge 18ft high and 24ft wide ‘Coins Mural’ of 45 coins, which hangs over the entrance of State Bank’s Learning Resource Centre. That project, which was initiated in November 2004, was finalised in April 2005. “I have done many sculpture and painting exhibitions both here and internationally but this exhibition is very special for me,” said he. “While doing the big mural some years ago I thought several times about acknowledging the artists who had designed the coins,” he said, adding that the current exhibition was a homage to all the artists and designers who had produced coins for Pakistan.

Earlier, SBP Museum director Dr Asma Ibrahim said that they at the museum hold a different kind of exhibition each year on Pakistan Day. “And this year we thought of doing it on the theme of coinage, which combines history and art while adding to people’s knowledge of the country’s coins issued over the years,” she said while also sharing some information about SBP’s Money Museum, the only specialist economic and central banking museum in the country designed to educate and inform people about Pakistan’s economic and banking history as well as the origin and role of the SBP.

SBP Deputy Governor Jameel Ahmad also said that he was glad to be opening another very interesting and informative exhibition on the day of the passing of the Pakistan Resolution. “These coin models are being exhibited for the public to not only enjoy art, architecture and museums, but also to get insight into our history,” he said. “I am also happy that at this exhibition, people can also witness the several periods of coinage starting from cowrie shell to the decimalisation of coinage and a table of conversion, the design process and a chronological history of coins of Pakistan from 1948 to date,” he said.

Published in Dawn, March 24th, 2019