Rabeya Jalil's recent exhibition at the Koel Gallery in Karachi is an engaging, often provocative, portrayal of the mundane and the ubiquitous. Sarah Kazmi finds the Lahore-born artist experimenting with ways to narrate her perception of the individual in society ...
Rabeya Jalil’s recent exhibition at the Koel Gallery in Karachi combines an acute sense of detail and abstraction. Tersely titled “Name. Place. Animal. Thing”, the exhibition showcases the artist’s paintings and prints as a reflection of the individual’s struggle in society – one that she allows her audience to connect with and interpret for themselves. For the Lahore-born artist, her audience are both insiders as well as spectators let into her world of shifting experiences.
The gallery had paced Jalil’s work in such a way that one felt compelled to move from painting to painting, rather than focusing on a particular piece at length. But, as people appeared to find, the experience did not jar.
The exhibition showcases Jalil's paintings and prints as a reflection of the individual's struggle in society - one with which she allows her audience to connect and interpret for themselves
The artist’s personal statement allows one to dive directly into the content of her creative work, but there is much more to it than this. Jalil’s work touches on the everyday: the events and conversations of the common individual. Her pieces such as “In the name of…” and “Praying for nine lives” are a gentle, but well-aimed, pun on the conduct and use of religion. Her work also holds a mirror up to the audience’s own character and the multiple identities that people shift between.
Bird Eating Bird, acrylic on board
The nuances that underscore her painting "Praying for nine lives" invite introspection on the audience's part: are we even praying or is it merely an act - an exhibition of piety for the world?
Jalil’s work calls to mind her last co-exhibition at Art Chowk, titled “When I wake up in the morning”. The language of the exhibition is reflected once again in the body of work displayed at the Koel Gallery. The nuances that underscore “Praying for nine lives” invite introspection on the audience’s part: are we even praying or is it merely an act – an exhibition of piety for the world? The two separate pieces that comprise this work are the Janus-faces of religious piety divided from social humanity. The discord clearly reflects our own division as a society and a country.
The surrealist piece “Crying flush” compels the viewer to engage with the painting carefully. One might attempt to “flush” away one’s everyday miseries and agonies, but where to? Perhaps this is simply the act of hiding them in oneself.
“Days in a Calendar” is an extension of Jalil’s earlier work of the same title. While the first piece narrated the artist’s personal struggle with life in Pakistan vis-à-vis her life abroad as an art student and practising artist, the second tells a different anecdote. The “calendar” is not the average calendar, reminding one, perhaps, of the socioeconomic value systems, class barriers, and influences that rule our lives and our very existence as Pakistanis.
Jalil explores communal and political narratives through the appropriation of childlike images, depictions of ordinary people, and nebulous forms
“Compulsive celebrations” is one of Jalil’s most thought-provoking pieces. It is a constant reminder of how society obligates one to adhere to certain rules, irrespective of whether one wants to. Jalil captures the agitation of her subjects’ otherwise animated faces as they are forced to take part in the celebration.
The vibrant, if discomfiting, piece “Bird eating bird” draws the viewer in: a creature resembling an ostrich looks directly out from the frame, almost eye to eye with its audience. The provocative title itself becomes even stronger when paired with the painting. If the birds are taken to represent us, the painting portrays our multiple identities as people bent upon eating each other up in the name of social pressure, authority, and influence.
The Crying Flush, acrylic on canvas
Jalil’s work represents a great deal of social observation: she aims to explore communal and political narratives through the appropriation of childlike images, depictions of ordinary people, and nebulous forms. While the sensitivity of her work is enough to trigger immediate emotions in her audience, it also allows them to conjure their own interpretations. Her prints and paintings are subjective stories of universal problems that every viewer can relate to.
Using acrylics gives her a chance to let her mind function freely - like a child's - allowing the canvas to become a space for risks and mistakes
One cannot help but notice the range of her palette – from soft colours to bright cadmium hues applied directly from the paint tube, as she points out. The use of raw colours is a deliberate choice, which, Jalil says, allows her to experience the nature of “uncooked” or unmixed paints. With the paint drying fast, using acrylics gives her a chance to let her mind function freely – like a child’s – allowing the canvas to become a space for risks and mistakes.
The bright colours that Jalil uses explore a child’s viewpoint of the pictorial dynamic by linking her stories to a more mature audience. By combining mundane objects with symbolic elements and everyday occurrences – whether depicted in the form of a toilet seat, a sink, a prayer cap, a prayer mat – the artist speaks about the ordinary activities that run one’s daily existence as a Pakistani. Compared to her previous exhibition, one can see that Jalil has made a remarkable transformation as an artist, creating work for a mature audience but retaining childlike sensibilities. “I have stopped being scared of my mistakes,” she says. “I look forward to them.”
