ART FACTS: Panorama of creativity

Masood Kohari is the pioneer and leading Pakistani artist who adopted the unique medium of crystal collages, glass work along with painting and drawing as a medium of expression. His sensibilities of form, texture and colour through different medium make him a multi-dimensional artist who received national as well as international recognition.
For about five decades he is constantly striving and seeking the truth in the form of paintings, drawings, crystal collages and fire paintings through the complex process of creativity. The current exhibition of colourful paintings by Masood Kohari at the Citi Art Gallery, Karachi shows panorama of creativity with artistic approach. This time Kohari has chosen to concentrate on paintings only though he has been experimenting with drawing, ceramics glass medium and sculpture for a long time.
He enjoys experiencing various mediums to communicate with the masses. He proves himself in experimentation with new materials which is a difficult task. His palette is subdued with soft colours that match as well with his subject and helps in enhancing and supporting his ideas and feelings. Although red, blue and yellow dominate his work but these colours are balanced and in soft tones giving a pleasant look to the painting rather harsh and loud.
Living and working in France for over forty years, results in more passionate and strong relationship with his motherland. Though he is a painter with great potential, he became very involved with ceramics in the mid 60s. In 1966 he decided to visit Thatta and Hala. Both towns has unmatched archaeological sites and traditional centers of tiles and pottery. There he got deeply inspired by the medium and decided to work seriously in it.
Kohari produced thousands of art pieces throughout his long career. But a major part of his work is based on ceramics and glass work on tiles and vases - the real medium for his artistic expression.
No doubt Kohari is an artist of diversified skills but while going through his paintings during my visit to the gallery I find glimpses of foreign touch in his work. As he has been living abroad for a long time his female facial features and hairstyle gives a foreign look. But the contemporary approach of his work shows his deep understanding of the medium, which enable him to evolve an aesthetic viewpoint for the viewers to ponder.
He is popular and well-known for his immensely innovating and inspiring works. The colours, marks and textures fill his creative urges. His work is marvellous and speaks for itself. His recent paintings in oil on canvas reflect the situation and environment people are experiencing in our country specially women.
The exhibition focus on women images sometimes faded in the background and the other time full of energy and romance. Every painting equally portrays the expressions and the amalgamation of figures and situations in the background. The happy as well as sombre mood of his female figures is subtle in their disposition. The artworks are captivating and mystical blending the colours with spaces and figures. In some of his paintings he symbolically paints crows for wickedness.
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