Notes from a Familiar Space is a presentation of works by five artists— Bushra Anis, Filza Baloch, Manahil Khurram, Samra Mansoor and Zahabia Khozema— in conversation with Fazal Rizvi. The works negotiate with the ambivalence of dormant and awake spaces as the artists reconcile with notions of possession and dispossession. Meticulously plucking away at the comatose threads of time that await redemption, the works meander through a quiet nostalgia disturbed by careful intervention, ironed into neatly arranged musings. Rizvi’s presence in the show is unmistakable, he is adept at taking meticulous slivers of thoughts and dignifying them with cautious distinction, untainted by flourish. The show is carefully maneuvered through the artists’ personal archives, real or imagined, it lulls in and out of the feeling of an old friend that is bursting at the seams with stories, leaving behind the bitter-sweet taste of nostalgia.

The format of the show as a conversation with Fazal Rizvi, allows for another intangible layer seeping into the work. He assumes the role of an invisible narrator through his writings presented alongside the works, thus offering tools for further engagement.

Bushra Anis navigates through the idiosyncrasies of her home with endearing witticism. She documents the flaws within her home as images with sticky notes pasted atop, alongside audio narrations. Through her documentation the objects morph into these vagrant caricatures, which assume a life of their own as they push out of their sockets, some mischievously chipping away (to one day leave a gaping hole in the wall), and a rain of rubble. She uses humor to relay these anecdotes, but between the cracks and crevices lies the quiet hesitation of living with her mother and sisters alone. Anis cavorts with the theatrics of her home in jest, and a guileless sensitivity, as she tries fixing the flaws within her home.

Filza Baloch presents an archive of her ancestral home in Sukkur, collecting fragments of stories pulled from the soil, the yarn sweater left behind, an empty diary. She uses videos and photographs to converse with the viewer. The debris she collected from her visit to Sukkur are laid out on a table with a white sheet, neatly arranged as an imagined archive. Samples of soil and chipped wood, and other discernible and indiscernible fragments, are laid out which she muses over with her own thoughts written in pencil. Traversing through fable and friction, she creates a map of memories that belong to her, the one’s passed down to her and the one’s she scavenged through. Perfectly encapsulated in her video titled, The Soil Remembers; albeit, visceral in nature the soil cradles the passing of time and its inhabitants in a deep caress.

Manahil Khurram explores the shamiyana, a temporary structure of stretched cloth that is used indoors and outdoors to create sections, sometimes purely for function, but it is also a decorative intervention. The works presented are photographs of the structure installed in multiple locations. Her inquiry began with installing the shamiyana in domestic spaces to further section the space, pondering upon what it means to do so. She then takes the shamiyana installations onto the streets, the juxtaposition of the structure against commonplace scenarios allows for an interesting intervention. It’s a rather alluring way to navigate through perfunctory gaze. The use of the shamiyana as a visual device works into these situations like a decoy, it becomes a compelling departure point to rethink intimate spaces and the idea of things hiding in plain sight.

Samra Mansoor’s works delicately catapult around the mortal dispositions of existing while acknowledging the violent structures that lead to the loss of human lives. Traversing within the personal and the political, her representation of grief is aggravated by its implicit erasure. Her qualms are presented through multi-disciplinary practices. Her delicate paper sculptures of birds serve as metaphors for bodies dispossessed. Her installation Memories of Neither, where she arranged collected soil on the tiles of the gallery (meant to be walked on and scattered) aptly illustrates the act of erasure as a consequence of human intervention. Mansoor’s work is laced with nuance and a quiet disposition that leaves room for introspection.

Zahabia Khozema’s investigations of the self are in conjunction with the city which she mediates through a fictitious organization Anjuman e Inthihai Pareshaan Auratain (Organization for the Extremely Concerned Women), which addresses the unequivocal fallacies of the public transportation system in Karachi and its discrepancies towards women. Her practice is informed by visual devices of activism, thus presents as an effective means of communication. Khozema is aware of her position as an artist as she navigates through the public space, she is wary of bringing in a camera to document her journey, leading to a more nuanced presentation of her concerns.

The show is a quiet cultivation of fragments of self and beyond, that slowly but shrewdly reveal themselves as potent renditions of despair, loss, redemption and existence.

The group show titled Notes from a Familiar Place opened at AAN Art Space and Museum on the 3^rd of February, on display till the 10^th of March.

Image Courtesy: AAN Art Space & Museum

Title image: Manahil Khurram, Untitled 4 – Photograph of outdoor installation (Archival print on Canson infinity)  – 4 x 6 Inches – October 2020