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The anxious Rashid Rana

I went over to bask in my friend’s creativity as he was putting up his work in Chemould Gallery the other night, though I was wary at what craziness I might be drawn into.

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I went over to bask in my friend’s creativity as he was putting up his work in Chemould Gallery the other night, though I was wary at what craziness I might be drawn into.

On the eve of his shows Rashid Rana is particularly charged by his anxieties. He changes his mind at bewildering speed, wall up, wall down, repaint, rehoist, wants to do it all over again.

A mutual friend said that if he wasn’t making half a million dollars for the gallery, he is Pakistan’s best-selling contemporary artist, they wouldn’t put up with him.

10 years ago, I saw Rashid in his studio in Lahore, 5 years ago in New York and now here and anxiety is still at the heart of his art process.

For example, he has made an installation in which the video projection on two adjacent walls is a loop where two aeroplanes are flying into each other but before the crash they retreat, and the action repeats itself indefinitely.

A top television personality in this city, a Rashid collector, described this piece in hushed tones,taking care to mention that the work is placed in a room which has the temperature of an aircraft cabin.

Probably, no one has been more unsettled by the piece than Rashid himself. He gave up flying for a year and half and only came to Mumbai because the above-mentioned mutual friend held his hand through the flight describing the hand holding as a most chilling experience, not least because Rashid lay crucified to his seat, palms up, ankles together.

A Delhi-based photographer has advised Rashid that he should make art that now makes him lose his fear of flying. No chance I think, because I have yet to see Rashid make art that doesn’t seduce to cause anxiety.

My favourite work at this show is the image of a Persian carpet that up close is made up of photographs of scenes from a Lahori slaughterhouse. 

There is one moment of a double recoil when after being attracted by the carpet, I move into viewing the intricacy of the design, am alarmed by the goriness of the small images and on realising how the blood red of the Persian carpet came to be so, recoil from the larger image as well.
—ansari.rehan@gmail.com
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