At home with the title ‘Non-Object’, Affan Baghpati is a sculptor, coppersmith and silversmith, jewellery maker and a cultural cartographer. His aesthetic sense is informed by the age-old intricate patterns of the surmadani [eye-liner container] and he is equally at ease with discarded items in the second-hand markets of Karachi and other cities in Pakistan. One could say that he is a wanderer who seeks beauty in the strangest or most bizarre places.

A Barbie/Ken doll is ripped off its original ‘glory’ (pun intended); it dons a beard and hangs from the head of a plastic-like miniature crocodile. Humour and critique run parallel to one another in a very subtle but telling manner. Baghpati’s source is the here and now and, whatever form he finds the object in, he has fun with it.

Layers to his narrative begin to emerge gradually and quietly. In the whimsical work titled Bakri Wala, for example, he puts together a doll’s head, a miniature bakri [goat] and parts of metal and stones to create an unexpected and unique form. The fine detailing reveals Baghpati’s passion for craftsmanship.

He adds to what has already existed as a toy or as part of a utilitarian object, extracting from it what he needs and builds something which never existed before. It is new and it is old, for he never lets go of its history, holding on to the object’s identity, and conversing with it in this moment.

Affan Baghpati’s recent solo show raises questions about art, space and viewership

The viewer is drawn to the central room created as a tamaashgah, or performance arena, with theatrical lighting and dark walls. The moment the street performance enters the art gallery, or even the artist’s studio, it starts a process of its transformation. This is what makes the work relevant and one could say that the questions that arise because of it are special and specific to Bhagpati’s art.

In our walk through and subsequent conversation, he talks about wishing that there would be questions and even conflicts emerging in the discussions and writing about any art work. The questions that arise from a work are perhaps more telling of the work and, more importantly, of its interpretation.

The three characters in the performance or tamaasha, as he calls it, allude to references in Urdu such as aasteen ka saanp [enemy within the ranks], magarmach ke aansoo [crocodile tears] and bali ka bakra [someone who would rather suffer than allow others to]. In the tamasha, this alludes to a goat, a snake charmer and the crocodile, the latter about to eat none other than the localised ‘Ken’ doll.

The artist takes ownership of the form, effortlessly connecting to his lived experience. On the one hand, we have the most unusual but beautiful object in front of us, but the concern that arises is, why does this thing of immense beauty also strive to be this exotic? Is it the artist’s intention to seduce the viewer or is the richness inherent in the physical form?

How are we interpreting something so common as a bakri ka tamasha as something unique or unheard of? Does it also not show how removed the gallery audience is to the world outside, as if it were another world? Why are we looking at the snake charmer or even the bearded person as ‘another’ when it is a common sight?

Secondly, what really is the exhibition space? What role does lighting play and when do we consider any show to be well mounted? And this is also a general question that I have also asked myself while curating: are we following or appropriating something prescribed by a Western museum?

I am not sure what the answer is, but each show also raises the question of a bigger structure and of the connections of space, alongside the way we live and work inside that prescribed frame. It might be worth considering how Baghpati is conversing with it.

Is the tamaashgah intended as a pun? Surely, we are not in the times of the angrez raj [colonial rule]? So, how does the artist read the form and intend it to be read and how do we interpret this disconnect of the outside to the inside?

This space that transports us to Baghpati’s world of imagination and brings us humour is surely a loaded arena of many other concerns and ideas yet to be articulated. What do they hint at? What is the role of subtlety in his form? What geographies are we studying here, where we see remnants of goods? And what about this cannot be written and published in this context?

What happens to objects retrieved from the present, or to those discarded by someone 50 years ago? The artist becomes the shaagird [student] of the craftsperson and follows the dance of the passionate and in it finds his reflection. His aged soul meets the plastic toy and here he dances with joy, disrupting the hierarchies of material and ideology.

‘Non-Object’ was on display at Koel Gallery, Karachi from February 14-March 1, 2023

Published in Dawn, EOS, March 12th, 2023