Artist Mashkoor Raza's bold and soft compositions

Filled with energy and life Mashkoor Raza's new works at Ejaz Art Gallery, Lahore were like a breath of fresh air. 

The artist has great natural creative ability and skill in rendition of colours, handling of space and composition. 

His forceful strokes combined with a play of light and shadow invigorates the women and horses he painted on canvas. He put into practice a highly developed sense of design, form and colour.

During more than four decades he has established a distinctive mode of expression. His boldly rendered horses and glamorous nudes in abstract have become his signature style. With a blend of abstraction and cubist component, he creats aesthetic transparent impressions.

His recent semi-abstract and abstract work was a bit different from his known style. He brings out texture with wash technique and created images through abstract cubic forms on contemporary note. This time his compositions were in bold and soft colours that he hasn't used before. He also changed the background of his paintings, which were more bold and attractive. There were a few black and white panels of horses in which he brings out the highlights of this strong and beautiful animal.

The horse - a majestic animal bears immense fascination for Mashkoor. Horses serve both as a subject and symbol in his paintings. He portrays horses as a symbol of beauty, power and speed.

Mostly Dutch and French artists over the centuries incorporated horses in their paintings. But no one has created such ingenious and intricate abstract compositions with a lively and exciting line work and no one has used such glowing colours in variegated harmonies like Mashkoor in Pakistan.

From images of women to action-packed horses the exhibition offers a wide perspective of Mashkoor's work. Thus experimenting with his own style of work he produced unique pieces of art that has reflections of his signature style. He may have given a contemporary touch in his new work but the distinctive characteristics that identify his work remain intact.

A recipient of Pride of Performance, Mashkoor Raza is acclaimed for his non-representational and abstract/cubism styles which have become his inimitable signature.

A book "Mashkoor Raza's Journey" written by Nadeem Zuberi was launched a few years ago, which reveals some of the many different experiences of Mashkoor's life and different phases of progress of his work, revealing a story of the ability to motivate one's creativity and the journey of self-discovery.

After graduating from Karachi School of Art (KSA) in Fine Art Mashkoor Raza participated in many national and international exhibitions around the globe and his paintings have been selected for the art collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. He held his 50th solo exhibition a couple of years ago which is an honour for the artist as he is the only artist of the world who has reached to a golden jubilee of solo shows.