A fusion of abstract art and calligraphy

LAHORE:Adnan Baig, despite being a very successful businessman, a law graduate along with a Master’s degree in Psychology, is an artist by nature, perhaps, the first and only Pakistani artist who has united Abstract Art with Calligraphy in a unique fusion of the two different schools and styles of art in his paintings, to be exhibited at the Ejaz Art Galleries soon.

Adnan has been in the quest of defining various emotional states of human soul through Abstract Art, which to him is the perfect vehicle to transfer the inner, most feelings on canvas. He was born in Gojra, the land that gave the world the best Hockey players, and then shifted to Faisalabad, where he was brought up by his well-known business family.

Adnan was in love with art, especially colours, at a very early age. Like any other tender soul, besides art, Adnan had a special interest in poetry and has been one of the few highly acknowledged Urdu poets in our country.

He is not only known in the literary circles for his poetry, but also for his very refined and cultivated taste for finer things in life, including Fine Arts. To Adnan, art is life. Adnan Baig is completely a self-taught artist, has no formal art education or training from any art institution too. This multitalented artist, businessman, poet and a law graduate, never stopped painting and nothing could kill his love for art, not even his highly busy life as a businessman. To him ‘Art is my life’, and truly qualifying this tall claim, he confessed that he would continuously keep painting abstract designs, sketches and even paintings while having business meetings in his office.

Recalling his childhood, Adnan remembered that he got his first appreciation for the artwork from his schoolteacher on a ‘Still Life’, when he was in 6th Class. Adnan has a mystical relation with Abstraction.

To him abstraction has a mystery and hidden meanings to every sensitive feeling. “Abstract Art has been fascinating me since a very early age, Adnan confessed”. He loves Picasso and, like Picasso, he also believes that its not the job of the artist to define his work but it should be left to the viewer to decide what it may be. “My Art is my poetic expression and that’s the best I could say about my own understanding of my work.

About his work, Adnan commented, “An exploration of non-objective abstractions is my work. I believe it should have close similarity to a musical symphony, which is the most abstract form of art. I also believe that a painting must be rhythmical, harmonious, and life-like with a streak of spellbinding magic. It must communicate. I create something out of nothing through a combination of colours, texts & textures, materials, and torn or cut up bits of a collage et al.

Sometimes I draw on paper before painting on canvas whereas at others, I work intuitively.I set my inner self, as it were, at liberty to express what it wants me to. Geometric shapes, figurative balances, and calligraphic strokes haunt me”.

Adnan added that “I grew up with a passion for colours. My recent work is a poetic expression of my exploration, my frantic but earnest endeavour to 'know' myself as also to know the Creator, to converse with Him.”

Now, Adnan Baig has brought his recent work, spanning over 10 years, to the Ejaz Art Gallery, MM Alam Road in a solo exhibition, which is going to be his first solo exhibition as yet. He loves to work in Mixed Media and Acrylic and the 28 huge paintings to be displayed at Ejaz Art Gallery are basically a fusion of Islamic Calligraphy and Abstract Art in vibrant colours.