Week-long art activities to start at PNCA today

Islamabad:Week-long art activities including a group art exhibition, performance, workshops, storytelling, and a seminar by various artists will start here tomorrow(Tuesday) at the Pakistan National Council of the Arts (PNCA).

The activities will continue till November 16 during which Diversity and Social Harmony'' by various artists featuring traditional and contemporary arts will be presented for art lovers on November 8, Performance and Workshop on Understanding abstract painting by Rakshanda Atwar will be arranged on November 9 while a calligraphy workshop will also be arranged by Riffat Khattak on November 10. Dastangoi or storytelling event by Dr. Waqar Azeem and Sadia Hyat will be part of the activities on November 10. A presentation and Mixed Media Painting Workshop by Hassnain Awais will be organized on November 11. A Seminar on Miniature and a Demonstration by known miniature artist Najam H Kazmi and participating miniaturists will be held on November 16. The exhibition includes an exquisite collection of artworks, including paintings and ceramics as an attraction of Pakistani art.

The event is a collaboration between Nomad Gallery and PNCA.

S. Najam Kazmi, Samina A. Akhtar, Zafar Ali, Khurram Abbas, Hassan Sheikh, Areej Nasir, Emaan, Tauqeer Hilbi, Alefiya, Rakshanda Atawar, Hassnain Awais, Nabahat Lotia, Jamil Hussain and Kuzhad are among the participating artists. Pakistani art has a long tradition and history. It consists of a variety of art forms, including painting, sculpture, calligraphy, pottery and textile arts such as woven silk.

Ceramics and glazed pottery are among the oldest art forms in Pakistan, dating back to the Indus Valley Civilization (2500 BC). The most popular techniques used include engraving intricate designs into the undercoating of the pottery and then glazing it with coloured transparent glazes.

"The arts are a very wide range of human practices of creative expression, storytelling and cultural participation. They encompass multiple diverse and plural modes of thinking, doing and being, in an extremely broad range of media. Both highly dynamic and characteristically constant features of human life, have developed into innovative, stylized, and sometimes intricate forms.