Archived exhibition

At Intervals (Three Moving Image Works from Pakistan)

At Intervals (Three Moving Image Works from Pakistan)

Basir Mahmood (Lahore)
Seher Naveed (Karachi)
Fazal Rizvi (Karachi)

Exhibition continues until 15 February

At Intervals (three moving image works from Pakistan) a satellite exhibition to Naiza Khan's Disrupting the Alignment features three emerging film artists from Pakistan that has been co-curated with Karachi based writer and curator Gemma Sharpe.

The three works represented in this exhibition share a number of sensibilities, in particular a mode of indirect address. All three pieces appear to be ‘peeping around the corner’ of their subject matter and they often verge on the voyeuristic, activating the realist and documentarian nature of video and photography.

Basir Mahmood’s Lunda Bazaar (Second-Hand Clothing Market), (2012)for example, sees the artist watching various men and one woman trying on second-hand outer clothes in the open space of a popular Lahore market. Reflecting Mahmood’s combined attention to factual filmmaking and structuralist filmic tropes, Lunda Bazaar typifies his interest in Pakistan’s lower middle classes as a subject matter, along with the representative potential of mundane activities, places and objects. Fazal Rizvi’s I Only Just Want to Know You, (2011) is similarly object-focussed. The video shows Rizvi turning the pages of a battered and emptied photo album recovered from the detritus of the Tohoku tsunami in Japan. Produced as part of a residency at ARCUS Project in Japan, Rizvi’s work presents a (subtitled) dialogue with the ‘lost’ owners of this poignant object. Seher Naveed’s Carriers of a Day’s End (2014) on the other hand, utilizes slides that Naveed photographed in London while undertaking an MA at Central St Martins (2008-2009). A ‘slow moving image’ work, over the course of At Intervals, Naveed’s photographs will be subjected to the constant light of the projector. As the slides discolour and bleach out over time, the material apparatus of the work takes a lead.

Video art in Pakistan remains relatively rare, with few artists choosing to dedicate their practices to the medium or engage extensively with video and digital formats. Acknowledging this as a backdrop to At Intervals has informed the choice of works. All three artists reveal a materialist sensibility in terms of subject matter and material, demonstrating the manner in which their respective practices are informed by mediums such as painting and sculpture in their past (and present) artistic careers. The works collected here therefore operate at various intervals – between places, states of ownership, means of looking, and artistic materials.

Basir Mahmood is represented by Grey Noise, Dubai.

Installation views of At Intervals (Three Moving Image Works from Pakistan).
Images: Alan Hillyer, 2014. Courtesy of Cooper Gallery.

Basir Mahmood images, courtesy of the artist and Grey Noise, Dubai.

Seher Naveed images, courtesy of the artist.

Fazal Rizvi images courtesy of the artist.

Basir Mahmood (b. 1985 Lahore, Pakistan) studied in Lahore at the Beaconhouse National University, and received a yearlong fellowship from Akademie Schloss Solitude in Stuttgart, Germany, in 2011. In order to engage with situations around him, he ponders upon embedded social and historical terrains of the ordinary, as well as his personal milieu. Using video, film or photograph, Mahmood weaves various threads of thoughts, findings and insights into poetic sequences and various forms of narratives.

Since 2011, his works has been widely shown, including: The Garden of Eden, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, 2012; III Moscow International Biennale for Young Art, Russia, 2012; Inaugural Show, Broad Museum, Michigan State University, 2012; Asia Pacific Triennial (APT 7) at Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, 2012; and Sharjah Biennial 11. (2013).

Seher Naveed (b. 1984) completed a BA in Fine Art from the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture in 2007, Karachi Pakistan and an MA in Fine Art from Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design (University of the Arts London) in 2009. She has shown in various local and international group shows and is currently working as a senior lecturer in the department of fine art at the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture. She participated in the Sutra residency, Nepal in 2008 and also took part in Start Jordan, Jordan as an artist in resident. She is also a member of the advisory board at Vasl Artists’ Collective.

Fazal Rizvi (b. 1987) Rizvi graduated from the National College of Arts Lahore with a BFA Honours in 2010 and is an interdisciplinary artist working in painting, photography, installation, video and text. He has exhibited in Japan, Paris, Maastricht and within Pakistan. He was selected for the Arcus Project Residency Japan in 2011. Rizvi also started an ongoing curatorial project and the collective Chalo Chalo Lahore Chalo (www.chalochalolahorechalo.wordpress.com) in 2012. He currently lives, teaches and practices in Karachi.

Gemma Sharpe is a writer and critic with a background in Art History and English. She completed an MA in Art Writing at Goldsmiths in 2010 and has worked for Afterall Publishing, the ICA, Gasworks and the Triangle Arts Trust. She has written for Nukta, Art India, Shifter, MAP, Afterall Online, ArtNow Pakistan, and Untitled. She has contributed various essays to exhibition catalogues and printed publications, and has given talks at the ICA and The A Foundation in London, at Weld in Stockholm, the Indus Valley University in Karachi, and at 1Shanthi Road, Bangalore. She is a founder member of art writing platform 'antepress' and is a member of the 'Other Asias' research circle.

Image above: Fazal Rizvi, I only just want to know you, 2011. Video. Courtesy the artist.

Cooper Gallery Project Space is open Mon-Fri, 9.30am-5pm and Sat 10.30am-4.30pm and can be accessed via the Cooper Gallery doors on the east side of the DJCAD car park.

Disrupting the Alignment in Cooper Gallery is open from 17 January - 15 February 2014.

For more information on the exhibition please see: http://www.dundee.ac.uk/djcad/exhibitions/exhibitions/naiza-khan-disrupting-the-alignment/