Islamabad’s art scene

ONE would like to view the opening last week of yet another art gallery in Islamabad, the fourth this year in the capital, as a reflection of the fast changing character of a city that was once known as a cultural desert. This new gallery may not have the kind of impact which the public National Art Gallery made when it was inaugurated in August, some three decades after the project was first conceived in the 1970s. Nevertheless, this new showcase of artistic expression adds to a growing number of art galleries in the capital which now has eight in all. They are being seen as a strong statement of a growing interest in the arts and an increasing appreciation for creative expression in the once sterile capital city. While previously art lovers and buyers were mainly confined to the diplomatic corps and the top bureaucracy, today there is a new burgeoning generation of young executives in the corporate sector who, not satisfied with just mere prints, are developing a preference for having original paintings on the walls of their drawing rooms.

Earlier, the National Art Gallery had been hailed as a triumph of the development of art and the freedom of expression of the human spirit in Pakistan. It was featured in major newspapers, magazines and television programmes abroad, giving the country a positive projection internationally. No doubt individual Pakistani artists have already been making their mark in the global art market by holding exhibitions in galleries abroad. But it is the capital city's National Art Gallery with its towering black burqa-clad sculptural figures that stand at the entrance, its red brickwork building and its 14 galleries illuminated by natural light and showcasing some of the best jewels in local paintings, that has made the world sit up and take notice of the wealth of Pakistan's talent in art.