Inspired by classical Greek art Komail Aijazuddin's paintings expressed timeless truths about our society that seemed to be present thousands of years go in ancient civilisations in a solo exhibition titled "Out of the Blue" at Canvas Art Gallery, Karachi.
Having a Bachelor of Arts and Art History degrees from New York University, NY and Masters in Fine Arts from Pratt Institute, NY Komail has experienced to intersect notions of divinity, belief, statehood and personal faith through the current body of his work.
His paintings involved figures of speech or symbolism and do not literally represented real objects that define real subjects. The theme of his works revolved around a person's personal perspective of certain issues considered sensitive and also personal such as religion and patriotism.
His works were not stated but understood in what was expressed in the form of figures and symbols.
Having studied Greek and Roman art history during his graduation Komail became influenced by classical approach to figurative art. And after visiting Greece recently he became obsessed by the Greek art and the current series of paintings was created by him.
"During my time there I began seeing Greece as the inception site of what we believe to be the beginning of Western Civilisation, but also as a country that today is a gateway to Europe for the influx of refugees from the East. I like to experiment with the kinds of visual vocabulary that can describe religion and Pakistan in particular, so both the historical and contemporary significance of Greece became a profound place of departure for my work," stated Komail.
The shade of blue colour used by Komail also reveals his involvement with Greek art. As he goes through the art in Greece his mind absorbed the hue of blue in art there. And that blue is evident in his work clearly and it attracts the viewer as it fascinated the artist and the people thousands of years ago.
He elaborated the use of blue in his work, "I haven't seen blue being quiet as blue anywhere else in the world and the colour became an obvious access point, as you will see in most of the pieces."
Using his skills and creativity he created timeless themes with a sense of history and present scenario of the world and specially our country. His paintings were imbued by strong sense of human relation with history and religion regarding our nation.
The compositions depicted scenes of hardships and despair as well as patriotism can be seen in a few. Paintings titled "Jinnah with Thorns" and Jinnah with Shadow" had figure of Quaid-e-Azam among thorns and figure of Jinnah casting a shadow on the ground while a painting titled "Passport" showed a man in shadow with a passport in his hand. These paintings said a lot in a minimum expression.
He used thorns symbolically for danger as well as protection as were used in olden times to mark the boundary of an area in his paintings. He also borrowed Greek religious icons for his paintings and used silver leaf to give classical look to his paintings. In painting titled "War in Red" and "Silent Icons with Thorns" he used thorns very clearly and in there real sense.
A painting titled "Composition in Blue" depicted a scene that look as if came out of ancient Greece, with scantily garbed people having famous Santorini coast and blue domed houses in the background.
A few paintings titled "Mosaic in Spring", "Mosaic in Winter", "Mosaic in Fall" and "Mosaic in Summer" representing the four seasons show rows of trees in various colours according to the season were painted by the artist after being inspired by the mosaic tiles technique that are the main decorative element in ancient Grecian sites.
Thus his paintings reflected dual perspectives as he showed East and West amalgamation in them and showed implicit comparison of two different worlds.
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