Coronavirus has changed the world and how we see it. Art galleries are somehow coping with the lockdowns. AAN-Gandhara, Karachi, opened a solo show by Adeel uz Zafar on October 27. It was titled Paradise Lost.

On entering the gallery, the viewers expected Zafar’s unusual painstakingly engraved toy drawings, wrapped in bandages. However, this time the artist had converted the gallery into a think tank where one has to deal with restraints imposed by political, religious and social beliefs.

The exhibition was segregated into seven compartments. Each compartment had an installation with scripts and dates in a completely different setting. Upon entering the gallery, to the right was a small room screaming for attention. That was where Zafar’s first installation was placed. It was titled Chant & lament 1980. The room was pitch-black with only a shaft of light falling over an Islamic pattern hung on the wall. Mind-boggling sounds recalled some of the incidents from the year 1980. The sounds were so disturbing that it was hard to focus on the glittering Islamic pattern or even enter the room.

On the left, there were three small pieces hung over a red wall titled Inferno. Each piece depicted events that occurred on July 4, 2003; April 11, 2006; and February 16, 2017. The artist wanted spectators to decode and understand the depth of the work by searching for the dates. Those who remembered the dates could readily understand the works. The central wall was covered with torn pages from a book created by the artist. The book comprised 58 pages with foil-stamped gold faux leather cover. The pages, small engraved drawings on vinyl and plinth, were scattered over the wall having Zafar’s signature work - the bandage forming an image that was indecipherable from a distance. The book cover was again an Islamic pattern. There was a book lying on a stand often used for holy books. However, the book was one of Zafar’s drawings.

The artist put the message simply: “There is one holy book to understand Islam. Many try to manipulate and use it for their agendas and cause confusion.”

The exhibition was segregated in seven compartments: each compartment had an installation with scripts and dates in a completely different setting. Upon entering the gallery, to the right there was a small room screaming for attention. That is where Zafar’s first installation was placed. It was titled Chant & lament 1980.

The installations were arranged like a riddle or a game. Some of those were broken up into multiple levels. The artist seemed to be providing clues in the form of text from holy books to enable the viewer to reach the next level.

Standards was another installation. It has three flags to highlight the importance of raising a flag from the Islamic point of view. Each flag bore a different Arabic text script to point to some historical incident or some contemporary standards.

In the fifth compartment, the installations were documented as mere ideas in his head. There were five images titled IDOLS, each with a date and a year.

This room opened into another dark room where a vintage fabricated television was switched on with the words “whoever controls the past, controls the future”. In the seventh compartment, the artist had presented what all believers seek: paradise. There was a tiny golden frame providing a window on to the scenic beauty of paradise. The work was titled Lost Paradise. It bore the date: August 14, 1947.

The artists said, “the number seven has special significance in Islam and in our country. I deliberately segregated this installation into seven compartments. As Muslims or Pakistanis, we should think about what we have won or lost.”

He said some of the pieces created for the show were not on display over concerns about intolerance.

The writer is a    freelance journalist based in Karachi