Artistic evolution: Tracing roots of art and architecture

Academics, architects and artists deliberated on the roots of arts, identity and culture of the region.

The topics varied from decoding the Punjabi identity; understanding diverse layers of public spaces and the cultural, social and economic significance of the Silk Route; to the evolution of Islamic mosaic art.

University of Gujrat Vice Chancellor Muhammad Nizamuddin discussed the significance of public-private partnership in promoting academic growth. The THAAP conference, he said, was an example of such a partnership. “We need to go beyond what we already have and employ scholarly research for progress in arts and architecture,” he said. “Such forums can help safeguard our culture and preserve our art and architecture,” he added.

Public spaces

Syed Faisal Sajjad, an associate professor at the department of architecture at the National College of Arts, took the audiences on a photographic journey of transformation of Neela Gumbad, from before independence to modern times.

Sajjad presented his paper Public Space as a Cultural Palimpsest (the case of Neela Gumbud Lahore). He recounted various anecdotes regarding transformation of the area from the view point of people integrally linked to the area.

“It is important for architects to decipher the various layers of spaces, especially public spaces,” he said. Residents of an area should be involved in designing and upgrading of their locales.

Punjabiyat

“There is no fixed identity…it is all relational,” said Professor Ishtiaq Ahmed, presenting his paper Who are Punjabis and what is Punjabiyat?

Dr Ahmed, a political scientist and visiting professor at the Lahore University of Management Sciences, said the topic was a “politically sensitive “one.  People find it safer to maintain ambiguity on the subject, he said.

Identity, he explained, was both self declared and defined by others.

“The younger generation finds Punjabi language exotic and at times even amusing,” he said. “It [Punjabi] has been superseded by Urdu in routine use.”

Providing a definition for Punjabi was problematic, he said, Punjabiyat had somehow been damaged during the British rule and the Partition.

While West Punjab became divided along sectarian lines, East Punjab had fallen prey to differences between Sikhs and Hindus. “And yet there are sentiments embedded in the Punjabi psyche,” he said.

The Silk Route

The paper Silk Route(s) for Shared Roots: Central Asia and the Punjab was presented by Aruna Zahra Ashraf, chief architect of the government of Punjab, and Dr Neelum Naz, professor of architecture at the University of Engineering and Technology.

Ashraf said their paper documented their experiences during their journey exploring the Silk Route.

The Silk Route spanned over 7,000 kilometres and was an integration of land and sea routes. It involved the trade of silk, sugar, spices, herbs, dyes and horses.

“It led to a socioeconomic, political and cultural exchange between people along the route,” she said.

This was why the art and architecture of the region was imbued with influences from various cultures and civilisations.

Mazaars as mosaics

Owing to the prohibition of representative art in Islam, mosaic art in the East reached a level of sophistication involving complex calligraphic and geometric patterns that stood out from mosaic art in the West, said Aiman Chughtai.

Her undergraduate thesis project Mazaars as Mosaics: An evolution of Islamic geometric motifs and their application on the Shrines in Multan explores the subject.

Chughtai said western mosaics represented biblical scenes, primarily on glass, eastern mosaics on the other hand used ceramics. She said Islamic mosaics began in Iraq in the 9th century. They incorporated geometric patterns that became the symbol of Islamic architecture. Glazed tiled in blue and turquoise were still used in such structures in Multan, she said, however contemporary patterns were not as complex as the older patterns.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 7^th, 2013.