One-man show

Remember the saying ‘old is gold’? Well, one can truly understand the meaning of this statement after looking at the art work of legendary artists. Luckily, our country has a list of artists that have made us proud worldwide. Amongst them is the name Ajmal Hussain, who experimented with all genres of art. The artist passed away in April 2014 and recently, an exhibition was held at Zenaini Gallery to pay a tribute to his work. Read on to find out more about the artist and the exhibition.

Ajmal Hussain, the eldest son of Mr Altaf Husain, Editor Dawn, was brought to Pakistan by Mr Liaquat Ali Khan in 1946. Liaqaut Ali Khan had seen the young artist’s talent and insisted to start drawing political cartoons in order to help the cause for Pakistan. For 20 years Ajmal was a political cartoonist for a daily English newspaper.

Ajmal Hussain was among the pioneers who laid the foundations of The Arts Council, Karachi and initiated classes in art training. In 2012, he had been the only artist from Asia to participate in the Triennal d’art Contemporain of Paris, at the Cite International des Arts. A full page tribute to Ajmal was given in the official catalogue where a large digital abstract painting was shown. In the catalogue, it was written: “He is a great Pakistani modern painter. He continues to paint at the age of 87 without stopping.”

He was also a widely travelled painter, with studios in Paris, London and Karachi. Ajmal Hussain was perhaps the first Pakistani painter to hold a one man exhibition abroad. In 1952 his first solo international exhibition was held in Bad Godesberg, the capital of West Germany, the first artist from the East to exhibit there after World War 11. Other solo shows followed later in Geneva, Madrid, Tokyo, London, Paris, Munich and Milan. One of his paintings even earned a place of honour in the famous Salon d’Automne at the Grand Palais in Paris.

In Paris his works were regularly selected to be shown at the prestigious Autumn Salon, Salon Independent, Salon of French Artists, Salon of contemporary Arts and Salon of Leonardo Da Vinci.

For two consecutive years in 1971 and 1972 Ajmal was awarded first and second prizes respectively at the Contemporary International Art competition held in Vichy, France. In 1972 the Common Wealth Institute organized one of his major one-man exhibitions in London, where over fifty of his glowing acrylic series of neo-impressionist paintings were displayed.

Ajmal Hussain’s art ethos was a mix of his oriental heritage and western encounters. The artist has been called by some critics as the man of many arts. His expertise was not limited just to the easel; he had worked on other art forms such as tapestry and rug designing, clay modelling, wood carving and glass painting. Ajmal preferred to create pleasurable art with a touch of the extravagant and the surreal. Low-key, and non-materialistic, in his approach to life and art, he continued to paint for the sake of painting till the very end.

He has remained an experimental artist during his artistic career. This helped him to paint diverse series of paintings with different artistic ethos and style. His ease with every art medium and highly personalised painting technique gave him the freedom to experiment with various artistic ideas. This in turn helped him to paint some outstanding series of new genre of paintings. Each artwork is totally different from the other. Plural significance of the diversified contents and style of Ajmal Hussain’s work is uniquely individual.

Coming to his artwork that was displayed at the exhibition, the collection of his last paintings was the sum total of his past experience as a colourist, draftsman and experimentalist. Over eight different mediums had been used including metallic colours of gold, copper, oil, gouache and luminous oil pastel. All these mediums had been fused seamlessly to create a series of unusual luminous paintings. Diverse idioms like cubistic forms, geometric shapes and organic motifs had been meticulously merged with dominant figurative icons in his compositions. Each painting in this fusion series was perfectly balanced to create pleasant imagery on his canvas.

The exhibition titled ‘A retrospective’ was a blast from the past and it reminded art lovers that there are some artists whose work can never be forgotten.