The Lahore Literary Festival, the National College of Arts (NCA) and Rohtas 2 Gallery collaborated to present a major retrospective titled ‘…And Then Came Spring’ at the Tollinton Market — located next to the Lahore Museum and NCA. The event, which featured the masterful visual works of Salima Hashmi, became the talk of the town and beyond.

Hashmi is a renowned Pakistani artist, art educator, author and curator known for her significant contributions to art. She has taught generations of visual artists and art educators at the famed NCA, many of whom later became eminent and celebrated figures in the national and global art spheres.

She then served as the Dean of the Mariam Dawood School of Visual Arts & Design of Beaconhouse National University until 2014, where she is currently the Director of the UNESCO Madanjeet Singh Institute for South Asian Arts (UMISAA).

The retrospective showcased a diverse range of her work, spanning various mediums and reflecting her unique artistic journey over the years and decades from the 1960s to the 2020s. Hashmi’s diverse artistic portfolio of painting, printmaking and mixed media installations mostly recollect socio-political themes, addressing issues such as feminism, human rights and the cultural landscape of Pakistan.

A retrospective exhibition of Salima Hashmi’s work serves as a reminder of her enduring artistic contributions and defiance

Hashmi’s art is distinguished by a sharp sense of observation, which blends classic creative approaches with modern notions. As a prominent personality in art, her works are thought-provoking, displaying her dedication to artistic expression and social critique.

Her earlier graphite-on-paper drawings appear half-finished, drawn during her stay in Corsham, UK, while studying at the Bath Academy of Art. However, soon, they reveal a combustion of artistic intuition and architectural experiences. One can see checkerboard floors, which are very common in Gothic/Renaissance architecture, and faceless women framed within the manifestation of a grid.

Subsequent drawings show the details of consoles, cornices and above-the-door ornamental moulding observed at the Coleshill House — a double-pile building in Oxford that combines Italian, French, Dutch and English architectural ideas. Her concerns entirely change as she returns to Lahore in the late 1960s. One can see women in the outline, but the facelessness now makes a coherent sense under the veil.

The subsequent work reveals acrylic on canvases, mixed media, etching on paper and charcoal on rag paper. However, as the work enters the 1980s, Hashmi’s artistic concerns show an activist stance. The Women’s Action Forum and the Human Rights Commission grappled with bringing changes in art, poetry, music, photography, dance, theatre, literature and legislation, all of which affected Hashmi’s work. It was a natural stance for a sensitive artist whose father, Faiz Ahmad Faiz, endured his share of political repression for his revolutionary views.

Hashmi often goes back to her paintings and remembers how, particularly during the Ziaul Haq era, the rise of conservative ideas on morality, family, religion and politics forced creative practitioners to adopt reactionary attitudes in society, and to come under attack from right-wing politics and dictatorship.

As she was banned from appearing on television, Hashmi took a stance to be behind the camera, travelling the width and breadth of Pakistan, photographing marginalised women, children and vulnerable families.

Edward Hopper once noted that if he could have represented himself in words, he wouldn’t have been a painter. In the case of Hashmi, however, there is no shortage of verbal and written expressions, as she has authored and edited multiple publications and spoken on many international platforms about art and societal inequalities, much like Faiz, who opted for poetry as his creative channel.

Constant visual and virtual upheavals define the world around us and, in Hashmi’s work, textures convey the essence of turmoil and conflict. Her work draws attention to the underlying habitability shown by her distinct creative vision, which indicates hope and teaches us that we must not forego our potential.

‘…And Then Came Spring’ is on display at Tollinton Market, NCA from February 23-March 23, 2024

The writer is an art/design critic. He heads the Department of Visual Communication Design at the Mariam Dawood School of Visual Arts and Design, Beaconhouse National University, Lahore. He can be reached at aarish.sardar@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, EOS, March 17th, 2024