Polish academic’s films focusing on migration, women immigrants screened at KBT event

The Karachi Biennale Trust (KBT) hosted on Wednesday an event titled ‘Reading Hidden Stories with Anna Konik’ at the Ibrahim Joyo Auditorium on the premises of the Liaquat Memorial Library.

The event showcased two films by Polish visual artist, filmmaker and academic Anna Konik, who is on a visit to Pakistan to research for her work project on the topic of “Rizk and Risk”, which will be featured in the Karachi Biennale 2024 (KB24) taking place from October till November this year.

Konik said that she was delighted to be in Karachi and it was the first time she had visited Pakistan. She added that she had the sense of being on a journey that took place not only in space but also in spirit.

She presented her documentary film ‘Silence Heard Loud’, which features real people who have names, feelings, dreams and ambitions to present a perspective that she believes will make the public more sensitive to the realities of contemporary migration.

Her second film was ‘In the same city, under the same sky’. The work consists of 35 testimonies entrusted to the artist by women immigrants from Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Myanmar, Palestine, Kurdistan, Congo, Chechnya, Ingushetia, Somalia, Nigeria, Cameroon, Ecuador as well as Roma women, the majority of them now living in suburban ghettos or refugee centres in Stockholm, Bia ystok, Istanbul, Bucharest and Nantes.

The women told Konik their stories, often traumatic accounts of fleeing from persecution or mortal danger, separation from family, loss of home and fear for their loved ones. But also of rejection, aversion or racial hostility which they encountered in the countries where they sought refuge. Stories about invisible mental barriers spawned by fear of the other.

In the work, Konik made an attempt to connect two realities: the world of women from ethnic ghettos and the world of women living in normal conditions in their homelands.

KBT managing trustee Nilofur Farrukh said that sharing of the material by artists opened up new ways of thinking and introduced new perspectives. The mandate of KBT has always been to bring international artists to Karachi, she said.

“We share themes with them. They interpret it with their own lenses and experiences and being their work to Biennale. And in this connection that Anna Konik is here,” Farrukh added.

She said that Anna’s topic of Rizq and Risk revolved around food security. “It was inspired particularly by the recent floods that devastated vast tracts of land in Pakistan in the recent years. It raised food security and climate change concerns,” she said.

“Anna in her previous work very sensitively looked at the human conditions, geographies of people who have been displaced and disenfranchised, and migrants who leave their country for better future but face many hurdles and emotional challenges. Anna Konik’s work is in that space, where people are looking for home away from home,” the KBT managing trustee said.

She said that the KB24 will have many international artists and a large body of work will come from the local artists.

She thanked collaborators for supporting the event and understanding the importance of culture and how it can make a difference in society in the way people think and perceive our issues.

Secretary Auqaf and DG Culture Munawwar Ali Mahesar said Anna was covering a very important topic. He added that some of the people who migrated from their countries in search of a better future and some people were forcibly evicted from their land like Palestine who deserved more support than the preceding category.

Mahesar presented an ajrak and a book to Konik.