(Art+Micro) History: Contemporary Artistic Voices from the South

LECTURE – The next session of the (Art + Micro) History: Contemporary Artistic Voices from the South lecture series will take place on Thursday, November 25 at 11am on ZOOM.

To register : https://concordiaca.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZYuceGvqzwrGNIrWhYJo_abMt82nkz7paIy

(Art + Micro) History: Contemporary Artistic Voices from the South proposes a two-part talk series with contemporary artists living and working in Karachi, Pakistan.  As a megacity that is currently home to some 15 million souls, and until 2017 one of the ‘most dangerous cities in the world,’  Karachi has witnessed the brutal impact of the 1947 partition, ethnic and sectarian violence, the flow of capital, arms and goods, the Afghan War, and much more. This constant “ordered disorder”  state of Karachi, while unique to the particularities of its own context, is nonetheless reflective of the “colonial matrix of power”  that continues to impact the Global South in the shape and form of its various legacies.  

This complex history also means that creating any holistic understanding of Karachi only succeeds in creating little more than statistics. This project therefore aims to combine the framework and methodologies of microhistories to capture the complexities and ever shifting dynamics of this megacity, while making broader connections with the Global South.

More so, it not only aims to bring much needed attention to artistic production currently being undertaken in areas that don’t make it into the canon of western art, but also to understand the implications of working in highly charged environments, and producing work in places where there exists little to no institutional support. The project provides an opportunity for the audience to understand first-hand the issues that contemporary artists face in places like Karachi. 

This event is presented by Ethnocultural Art Histories Research Group (EAHR) in partnership with the Interuniversity Doctoral Program in Art History

Links for Registration

Part 2: Conversation with Fazal Rizvi, November 25 2021, 11 am EST: https://tinyurl.com/3326kxb3

Bios of Presenters/Moderator

Fazal Rizvi is an interdisciplinary artist. His inquiry rests somewhere between the personal, the social and the political. Having spent a few years thinking about the materiality and immateriality of the sea and its borders, Rizvi also keeps returning to the personal and familial as a place of trigger. Rizvi is currently beginning his long term engagement and research in reference to the glacial and mountainous terrain in the north of Pakistan, where he hopes to settle next year.
Rizvi graduated from the National College of Arts, Lahore in 2010. He has been an artist in residence at the Arcus Studios, Japan in2011, and was the recipient of the Charles Wallace Pakistan Trust award for Gasworks Studios Residency, London in 2014. He was also the recipient of the Pro Helvetia New Delhi studio residency in Zurich, 2020. He is currently a resident artist at the Jan van Eyck Academie, Netherlands for the year 2020-21.

Varda Nisar is a PhD Candidate at the Department of Art History, Concordia University. Born and raised in Karachi, Pakistan, her research attempts to understand the complicated nature of museums in Pakistan against the background of dictatorships. Growing up in a city where spaces for creative experiences were limited, she established the Karachi Children’s Art Festival in 2014, and headed the Educational Program for Karachi Biennale’s inaugural edition in 2017.