Amra Ali is art critic for The News, Karachi (in which this review appeared), and senior editor of NUKTA Art Publications.


Lubna Agha: strong form, effective contents
By Amra Ali

As soon as one enters Chawkandi Art Gallery, which is exhibiting the works of Lubna Agha these days, one is captivated by her energetic compositions, fluid brushwork and vibrant colours. It is only when one proper looks at the paintings that one is able to contemplate on the message and content of the paintings.

At the gallery, a viewer is confronted with one of Lubna's best works, Roots, which depicts the process of childbirth. The umbilical cord is about to break as the newborn baby is preparing to emerge out of the womb. The cord of life stretches to the bloodstained landscape and connects to the roots of a tree. Thus life, be it in humans or plants, sprouts from the soil where it returns to after both blossoming and withering.

To one's left is displayed another effective work Timeline - the storm, a narrow, rectangular canvas, drenched in a deep purplish blue. Across the canvas, painted in rich ochre, is a stream of figures moving horizontally. The figures are vague and may very well be golden leaves of a corn crop. The skyscape is treated with quick hurried brushwork. It is a rich sky with heavy storm clouds building up. Graphlike arrows divide the canvas into passages in history from independence of Pakistan in 1947 to the present times. One sees a gradual drop in the graph, deterioration with time.

The energy in Lubna's work flows from her ability to search for a meaningful fusion between her ethical and moral concerns and the artistic problems of the paint itself. Lubna's work not only engages in this dialogue but also serves to manifest her search for solutions, thereby opening newer possibilities.

Thus, one is drawn into Lubna's artistic process, which reveals her doubts, which are free from feelings of insecurity. It is a credible achievement, especially in our closed society, for someone to bear herself so truthfully.

Lubna Agha's work is a result of change and her penchant for risk-taking. It is the work of an artist, who having moved away from her motherland (she is settled in the US), has gone through a search for her identity and roots. She not only relates to the place of her early youth but also to the world that has opened before her in later years. Her thinking is thus not constrained by national boundaries. The artist has learned to look at things in larger perspective and is at the same time concerned with the cycles of nature.

Her paintings discuss the importance of woman, earth and fertility, or what American art historian Lucy Lippard calls "the link between nature and nurture". Woman and earth are synonymous. One feels a strong female presence in Lubna Agha's work--which may not necessarily be aggressive but it is certainly assertive.

In dealing with such issues, Lubna does not let content overtake her artistic style. Spontaneity and a tense interplay of colour and brushwork itself evokes an emotional response. It stirs one to see colour and line interact so intensely.

The openness of Lubna Agha's landscapes is the result of having lived in California for a long time and having absorbed her environment, its light and its skyscapes. The large size of her paintings and an overall sense of freedom may also be the result of her close relationship with her surroundings.

Lubna Agha is not a new name in this country's art circles. She achieved success soon after graduating from Rabia Zuberi's Karachi School of Art in the late sixties. In the seventies Lubna was producing her 'white' paintings and was selling very well. Later, she felt she was getting stale. Although marriage and two children had changed her outlook of life, these changes are not reflected in her work. Fortunately for Lubna, who migrated to California, the change of scene turned out to be artistically very rewarding for it opened new possibilities for experimentation.

The artist has now been away from Pakistan for many years. She feels that the county has deteriorated both morally and culturally. She herself can only relate to the Karachi of the seventies, which she feels were better times and the people were much more progressive then. Artists who migrate can use their childhood culture and imagery as a tool, and Lubna synthesises her past and present sincerely and, as it appears, naturally.

Her figurative canvases, which convey social injustice, are compositionally very dynamic. A case in point is the canvas of a man with eyes shut and a tear rolling down. This forms the central image and is surrounded by intense colour and line interaction. The progression of the tear is marked by arrows. In one such painting, the title from Maulana Room reads "So weep, even if you do not know the result; the everlasting gardens and rivers of paradise will be born from your tears."

Leaving California is another important canvas. At first glance, one sees a wide-open stretch of land and a beautiful blue sky. On a closer look, one feels that it may well be a woman opening up and getting ready to give birth. Fragmentation/Disintegration is another key canvas, depicting parts of the human body lightly painted together. It is in overall hues of pinks and reds.

There are spiritual references, in such canvases as Chilla, which is one of the larger oil paintings on display. A strong central figure is encircled by black crows on a deep blue background. The blue, a recurring colour in most canvases, suggests the fluidity of water. There are simple landscape like White Aspens and First Winter in Boston where the negative and positive spaces have been exploded.

Lubna's black and white drawings on paper are either studies for paintings or deal with the theme of the emotional side of woman. The drawing Woman in Fear shows the eyes of a woman whose hands cover the rest of her face. The palms facing the viewer are delicately ornamented with henna, symbolising the joy and fears that are part of a woman's life after marriage. But one can't help feeling that the artist's drawings border on being illustrative and do not work as well as her paintings.

Some art aficionados may find her colors bordering on the decorative. The fact, however, remains that the selection of colours is often a subconscious and instinctive decision. An artist does not necessarily have to consciously use certain colour to shock his viewers, in Lubna Agha's case the choice of colours is in keeping with the theme. The use of decorative borders as a framing device is a conscious choice of the artist in an attempt to infuse her graphic skills into her art. This graphic element is the result of the artist having worked in graphic design for the past many years. Lubna feels that she must try to synthesise her graphic and the painterly concerns. It also reflects an appreciation to crafts, such as quilt making or embroidery. Thus the artist dispels the distinction between high and low art and between art and craft.

All said, it is seldom that one sees such consistently high quality of serious work in one exhibition. I would have been very fruitful for Karachi artists, and art students to have had a chance to hear Lubna Agha's views on her progression as an artist, and on woman's art. Art galleries and art schools would do well to take note of this and in future arrange slide shows and lectures of visiting artists.