Fragility and Resilience’ by Ayesha Sultana… Sadia Pasha Kamran

Dear Ayesha Sultana,

I am taking this initiative to write to you and learn more about your insight on art as collective human expression and artists as people of mutual interests and common goals. After all, this is what Bano’s clan is all about – gathering wisdom, sharing experiences and striving for harmony. Remembering you from BNU days, you had a Monalisa-like aura, mysterious and feminine. Composed and quiet you stood out as a curious, cerebral human being, attentive and alert to conquer the world. I wonder if this enigma, obscurity and thrill that artists usually hold is an added qualification that comes with the art degree or if it already inhabits within the ones; thinkers and mystics opting for art as a way of living. Art education grooms the far-sighted and enables their soul to connect with surrounding realities. Art is a strange thing. It knows no boundaries, no barriers but a common instinct to address situations one finds oneself in as part of this universe. It is promising to see that the keenest amongst us to resolve and reprimand human conditions through art are the youngsters. Art instigates us to observe differences in human cultures and promotes an ethical attitude towards the unfamiliar. This is why, to understand other individuals and cultures, we have to have skills to interpret the art they make. Art does not mind race, gender or age. Ways of making and experiencing art are always linked with broad cultural contexts beyond the boundaries of any kind and this is where your art lies.

Born in Bangladesh and trained in Lahore before moving to the US where this recent body of work, along with some selected earlier projects displayed at Ishara Art Foundation Dubai, was created. In this way, you stand for a true global citizen interested in going places, absorbing the vibes and recognising your place in the process before taking up the notions concerning the wider world. The said show is all about this realisation and much more. The title of the show, Fragility and Resilience, indeed is a poetic justice to the collection. It beautifully caters to the ideas of vulnerability that embody endurance as an essential feature of not only this planet Earth but also human existence. While the medium glass, paper, and tissue silk exhibit the inclination of delicacy, the creative process is equally exquisite and intense. What is learning to control your breath if not being tough? What do water bubbles crafted in glass mean? A visual challenge, yes! But more of a poignant resistance. I shall perish but won’t evaporate in thin air. I shall break only to change my form, becoming sharper and more critical. After all, the entire story of this universe sums up into evolution and transformation. Your works embrace this ongoing process of cyclic and sequential development that spans over billions of years in form and spirit. You record the ideation of ‘being’ through your own breath that dictates marks on clay-coated paper. In other works, deep hues of blue, green and scarlet red that appear in metamorphic organic shapes on silk have a strong inclination towards the visual manifestation of Allah’s command Kun. In a way, you move from personal to universal and vice versa.

Your works do not require baroque ornamentation to attract the viewer. They consume the beholder merely by their presence. Not many dare to exhibit unfinished works, sketches and discarded unsuccessful experiments. But wait, then to someone who thinks in terms of resistance, struggle and surrender only to rise again nothing is final, finished and complete. In this journey full of creative ingenious it’s the mapping that you care for. Your artworks are the impressions you leave on this trail toward the discovery that life on earth is all about. They shall be cherished as souvenirs for those who shall follow you on the path of learning and understanding.

COURTESY