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National Art Awards in 2007 went to artists of long-standing and continuous art practice. Often in the public eye, the three artists involved richly deserve their accolades. They are Nahid Raza, who was awarded the President’s Pride of Performance; Mansur Rahi: President’s Pride of Performance; and Mashkur Raza, who received the Tamgha-i-Imtiaz. Congratulations to these hard-working painters.
NAHID RAZA (B. 1947)
Nahid Raza began her career in 1970 with a solo exhibition at the Goethe Institut, Karachi. The artist had travelled, studied printmaking in the USA. She has been predominantly an artist obsessed with the need to express her observations of life around her — the problems women face in urban life.
Her most recent work displayed, reveals a changed expression initiated by a stunning explosion of colour. She has titled the latest series Hidden Faces, which she refers to as ‘the faces shown in and to the public.’ In this body of work the artist creates a textural vocabulary, intimating undocumented happenings of daily life centred on the experiences of a woman struggling to define her own space and identity. In these paintings the surface textures are vibrant in description, increasingly involved with the reduction of ‘form’ and the language of colour.
MANSUR RAHI (B.1939)
Mansur Rahi received his initial art training from the Dhaka Government College of Arts, where Zainul Abedin was the Principal. He graduated in 1962, and between 1962 and 2002, he continued advanced art research studies in Japan, France and Germany.
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was awarded First Prize. In 1987, he was the recipient of the Shakir Ali Award. Rahi has shown his work in numerous solo exhibitions in Pakistan and abroad. In recent years, Rahi has brought about changes in his work while remaining constant to the root style of analytic cubism. Taking inspiration from the forms, he discerns in mountainous rocks. He speaks of his work as purely structural with shapes taking human form. Rahi refers to the influence of `Rayonism’, describing rays of light, forms and colours that create a ‘new dimension of illusion’. He is currently working on a series he titles Resurrect Rock.
MASHKOOR RAZA (B.1950)
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One of the most dynamic and most popular artists of his generation, Mashkoor Raza graduated from the Karachi School of Art in 1972. He was the ‘star’ pupil receiving top honours in the first division, and a gold medalist whose teacher, Mansur Rahi predicted great things of him.
In 1984, he was a prizewinner at the National Visual Art Exhibition held in Lahore and he went on to produce some of his most admired paintings, the wild, freely galloping horses in brilliant shades that he interspersed with abstract shapes. Mashkoor creates his vibrant compositions rendered from a contemporary viewpoint. His work has been seen in exhibitions in many countries of the world, and is included in the collection of the V&A Museum, London.
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