A luminous sojourn of Zarina Hashmi amidst the realm of displaced world

My heart my restless journey man Come, for they have decreed yet again You and I are to be made homeless one more time To wander the empty streets to roam across the lands .. to ask each alien passing by If he can tell us The way home Zarina Hashmi

On a quiet Saturday evening at India International Centre, Copal Art, Indias leading art advisory bank, concluded the 20th session in its lecture series, The Copal Dialogue. Titled Meditation on the notions of Musafir and Makan, this session took a closer look at Shadow House, the work of esoteric artist Zarina Hashmi.. The artwork was evaluated by acclaimed art historian, educator, writer and curator Ms. Roobina Karode with Mr. Ashok Vajpeyi, Chairman of Copal Art, presiding over the event. In his speech, Mr. Vajpeyi said that it was left to art to discover that all darkness contains some concealed unexplored illuminations about life, existence and nature. This is indeed what the artifice Shadow House revealed. A series of geometrically proportioned squares cut on Nepalese paper, it brings to mind images of Islamic architectures sculpted stone friezes and the screens (Jali) that allowed women to peep outside without them being seen. The interplay of light and shade effectively evoke a houses ephemeral nature. [Zarinas] work poignantly chronicles her life and recurring themes [in it] include home, displacement, borders, journey and memory. An avid traveler, her art mirrors the multiple meanings that the word home has for her, Roobina explained. An austere and unique vision that is well aligned with the life journey of the artist - an Indian who moved from Aligarh to New York over 40 years ago - the art work shows her displacement from where she was born and brought up to where she lives now. It highlights a desire to claim an undivided world as her own. As a diaspora artist, Zarina views home/nation as an archaeological site for excavation of what she left behind. Her art aims at retrieval and recovery of those traces, through the process of remembering and reflection. The minimal gestures of Zarinas space and form-making seem to unfold through her creation, etching out a vivid history that deals primarily with migration and the uncertainties of belonging. Zarinas work showcases a palpable sense of geometry. The artist imbibes sparse aesthetic and its appropriateness to her themes - the transformative play and tragic wit - has much more potent strength than many of her contemporaries. Roobina pointed out the artists evident affinity towards paper craft. Her art has always captured a very large geography of experience and insight. Indeed one look at Shadow House and one knows that every block etched is reverberating with memories of the past. A simple craft on a paper spread displayed influences of Sufism, Buddhism and Zen aesthetics. The minimalist visual emblems encapsulate the whole experience of a lifestyle or a belief

system. One feels that Hashmi, the eternal Odysseus or the Musafir, uncovers her perpetual memories of her Makan.