Aqeel Solangi

Life and education

Aqeel Solangi was born in Ranipur, Sindh. He graduated with honors from the prestigious National College of Arts, Lahore in 2003, followed by his first Masters degree MA (Hons.) Visual Art in 2005. He received his second Masters degree Master of Fine Arts (Pass with Merit) from the Bath School of Art and Design Bath Spa University Bath, Somerset UK in 2016. He was the recipient of Charles Wallace Pakistan Trust Visiting Artist fellowship for The Prince's School of Traditional Arts, London in 2006. Prior to this formal academic background, he has worked as Sign-Board and cinema board painter at Mehboob Painters in Khairpur (Mir's), and also attended extensive art courses at artist Mussarat Mirza's studio in Sukkur, Sindh. He was part of the 2013 Artist's workshop in China and Tumair Village Artists' residency organized by The National Art Gallery, Pakistan (Islamabad). Solangi has received 'A Vision of the Future-2006' Young Artists Award by The Lahore Arts Council in 2006

Art practice

Solangi's work is shown nationally and internationally in important venues notably Asia House London, Victoria Art Gallery Bath, Somerset, UK, Esse space Beijing,Amdavad ni Gufa Ahmedabad India, Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy, The National Gallery (Thailand), Alhamra Art Gallery , Lahore and The National Art Gallery, Pakistan (Islamabad). Much has been written about Aqeel Solangi's work and published in various publications.

Academic

Aqeel Solangi started his teaching career at his Alma mater National College of Arts, Lahore in 2004. Since 2007 onwards, he is teaching as an Assistant Professor at the National College of Arts, Rawalpindi Campus, where he has also served as its 1st Head of the Fine Arts Department. Solangi also taught at the Fatima Jinnah Women University (FJWU) and at the National University of Sciences and Technology (Pakistan) in SADA - School Of Art Design And Architecture. He was also affiliated with the Department of Fine Arts, University of Gujrat as a Member Board of Studies (2013-2016). He has also taught for one academic year at the Beaconhouse Educational Complex (BEC) for A-Level (Art & Design). Aqeel Solangi also conducts drawing and painting classes at the Studio Aqeel Solangi in Rawalpindi.

Apprenticeships and traditional art practices

Having an agrarian background, Solangi started his career as Sign-Board and cinema board painter at Mehboob Painters in Khairpur (Mir's) in 1996-1999, during this apprenticeship (Ustadi Shagirdi) he joined renowned artist Mussarat Mirza's studio in Sukkur, Sindh in 1999. In MA (Hons.) Visual Arts at National College of Arts Lahore, the course offered compulsory components ‘Seminars on South Asian arts’ and ‘a placement with traditional practitioner for 4-6 weeks', that led him to extend his studies and research in the field and wrote an extended essay titled: Classical Fresco painting (Naqqashi) (Formulae & Techniques in Indigenous practice). He opted his traditional placement with Ustad Saif ur Rehman for 6 weeks on Classical Fresco Painting (Naqqashi) in 2004 and this tie continued till his completion of studies at the National College of Arts Lahore in 2005-6. In 2006 he received Charles Wallace Pakistan Trust Visiting Artist fellowship for The Prince's School of Traditional Arts, London where he attended various workshops on Sacred geometry, Gilding, Islimi, Methods and Materials, Persian miniature painting and Icon painting.

Philosophy and approach to painting

‘The romantic notion of distant places and the intimacy of familiar places are strong ties connected to human sensibilities. Longing for unseen places, collecting and sending postcards that carry images of places strengthens this argument. The sensation of being somewhere and nowhere at the same time are the core concerns in my current practice. The practice of this romantic notion of place stems from found images in the form of collages out of very diverse sources like postcards, magazines, personally taken photographs, images from the internet, stills from movies and art (history). This is where my current practice is shaped: a narrated reference in collage translated into all the possibilities of paint.’

Jovita Alvares writes in ArtNow Pakistan about this painterly stance in Solangi’s work: ‘Just like the collages he creates, the paintings too, have layers added onto them, not only by means of imagery but also by the tactile medium as well. Solangi’s art is also an understanding of the importance of paintings, drawing and composition that have been studied over the years. The imagery creates movement and visual pleasure for the viewer. The brilliant compilation of thick brush strokes and translucent drips allows the artist to push back some elements of the paintings which making others stand out. The two dimensional surface is worked on to such an extent that the space created almost becomes something solid, something touchable.’

Latest work

The Sites of Myth

‘The Sites of Myth’ series of recent paintings exhibited at the KOEL Gallery, Karachi. Noorjehan Bilgrami writes: ‘Residing in a different environment, Aqeel experimented by varying the scale of his work – he pushed himself from working on smaller, manageable paintings to very large canvases…a scale that removed him from his comfort zone, bringing about a style of painting almost gestural, yet constructed carefully.

He juxtaposed “Nature and constructed Nature within the landscape, an amalgamation of uncharted sites and places visited,” as he lucidly explains in his article, ‘Resiting the Site.’ He clarifies his core concerns, “The sensation of being somewhere and nowhere at the same time…they are kind of complete/ incomplete stories within the familiar or constructed locations and are kind of crux of the moment. They radiate to some extent a certain sort of melancholy.”

Sally Bennett reads ‘The Sites of Myth’ series by Aqeel Solangi as: 'Through carefully constructed collages of photographs and found postcards, new places are created from old. But there is no accident or disorder here. Each place is a deliberately contrived entity where layers are revealed or hidden from the viewer. While we know the landscape of each piece is an artificial construct, Solangi’s skilled manipulation of his source material encourages us to connect with the scene. It is familiar and we may even feel we have been there. We become nostalgic for a world that doesn’t exist and the fragmented narrative in each piece lures us like Sirens towards the rocks; as if in a dream. However, this is not our dream. And, while there are autobiographical elements in the content, it is not Solangi’s dream either. The dream belongs to the protagonists in each piece. The people, places or objects of Solangi’s work are in their own world and we are observing them. His subjects are detached, preoccupied - whether they are playing with a Frisbee or reading a book - and our voyeuristic presence is tolerated but not warmly welcomed. We are drawn to a world that is impassive towards us; a message reinforced by the use of the sombre colour palette. The work is at once both familiar and strange to us, and it is the oscillation between these two states I find most fascinating about Solangi’s work. ‘The Sites of Myth’ will remind you of sights you have never seen, of places you have never visited, the memory of which will haunt you for a long time afterwards.' Dr Michele Whiting writes about The Abandoned Boat (2016) (work was part of ‘The Sites of Myth’ series):‘In this painting three figures narrate their relationship - at a moment in time - to a singular boat. Through a rigorous process of photography, the construction and composition of the painting tells of a pedestrian day in the making. Boredom, as an emotion, hangs heavy through the lack of engagement with the boat in the two seemingly disconnected figures, and the almost banal situation or site. An umbrella lies discarded to the forefront of the work. This object seems dislocated from the subjects, it is heavy like a fallen bird, one has the immediate view that it probably doesn’t function well any longer, but what is it’s purpose? Positioning the umbrella at the forefront of the picture plane, means that the artist has so positioned it for the viewer to be aware of looking into the reality presented, making us, the viewer cognisant of this action, and this is in opposition to Formalist theories that assert flatness and non-illusionistic tendencies. The umbrella here serves another purpose, in that it reminds us of certain Western art histories, such as Hans Holbein the Younger, whose work The Ambassadors, housed at the National Gallery, London and painted in 1533 shows an anamorphic skull hovering in the near picture plane as a symbol of mortality. Correlations can be drawn with the broken umbrella (although not anamorphic) unable to function and discarded into viewer ‘space’, expanding the flatness of the painting, with the nature of being discarded (‘discardedness’) accentuated through the situation of the boat.’

Early works

Many Art critics, writers and Art historians have written about Solangi’s work, since his first solo exhibition ‘Sufficient Grounds’, there are various publications that covered Solangi’s work. Aasim Akhtar wrote: 'What makes his work so unique is its combination of rigorous structural control with the humanistically expressive power of colour. In this duality one may perhaps find a lingering reminiscence of the opposition between the language of pure ornament and the anthropocentric ideal of the perfectly proportioned figure. His work is typified by the artistic adaptation of visual experience from everyday life, which often serves as his initial source of inspiration. Thus the point of departure for a painting may be a reference to an architectural detail – a section of a façade, or an ancient dry-stone wall – or some other found element. These fragments of reality are then formally encoded and endowed with a new and specifically artistic dignity via the use of colour.' He further writes: 'A master of elision, Solangi lets the part stand for the whole in his graphic paintings that feature overlapping fragments of landscape, ellipses and drapes. The effect is dreamlike yet not quite surreal. Solangi’s work captures a world of ruin and decay where the urban debris mixes with peeling paint to suggest forms of foreboding beauty. His paintings imply landscape, but the elements are abstracted, manipulated, and disconnected: Solangi’s colour choices and compositional balance are often exquisite. But he overthinks his material, and his reworkings sometimes give the work an air of hesitancy.' Nafisa Rizvi writes:'Aqeel Solangi traverses the three essential landscapes upon which the blueprint of the universe as we experience it is sustained – the sensory, the terrestrial and the celestial. There are several familiar territories in his paintings like dark clouds looming over faltering shelters and unfamiliar, fantastical ones like cacti floating through inundated bridges. But they all point to the fragility and transience of human experience and the aspiration for divine sustenance. These are not just grandiloquent statements that the artist uses as esoteric formulae for visual production.' Marjorie Husain writes: 'In his work Solangi has mastered the complex processes by which an artist views the world; the system of signs and symbolic forms, a sense of place, art and beauty, and the grandeur and beauty of the natural world. Evident in his work is Solangi’s interest in the sublime aspects of nature, often appearing as a hymn of praise. The artist has walked a determined and often difficult path to follow his muse, and one finds the joy and humility of true creativity in his work. In his youth, the closest art activity found in his hometown in Sindh was the painter of signs and cinema hoardings, so as has been the case with several of the country’s most distinguished artists, he attached himself to those painters.' Dr Akbar Naqvi writes: 'While speaking of Solangi’s skill as a painter, which is what he is rather than a philosopher or historian of culture, his observation strikes one. Be it an apple, a kashkol or its versions as an empty cup or an oyster shell or periwinkles, what looks like shredded paper as an abstract collage, are painted with minute details, as if Solangi had training as a miniature painter. It is the multiplicity of details, including heavy and light brush strokes in some paintings, which designs his contrapuntal paintings and increases their scope. His uninhibited use of eclectic technique, including pasting papers and painting them over as a variation of collage, ought to be commended. Solangi has reached a stage where his own works challenge him to improve further while negotiating with two styles and cultures, while remaining firmly rooted not just in Sindh, but Pakistan.' He further writes: 'Solangi’s painting or imagistic assemblage, as modern and contemporary as it can be, in which he uses various media and techniques, is dynamic without being kinetic art or action painting. It incorporates a paradox in which disconnection connects and movement is still with strong undercurrents and cross-currents below the surface. In the artist’s painting each is all and all each, a new permutation and combination of design in which geometry and numbers set up a new discourse of craft/art, and the self.'

Early works (2008-2014)

Exhibitions