NCA comes to Islamabad

Islamabad: Country’s most prestigious art institution, the National Council of Arts (NCA) has finally made its presence in the federal capital when it launched the NCA Auditorium in the building which previously hosted the Pakistan Manpower Institute (PMI) on Khayaban-e-Suhrawardy near Zero Point.

An art exhibition inaugurated by the caretaker Federal Minister for Education and Professional Training, Muhammad Yusuf Shaikh, in presence of the NCA Principal Dr Murtaza Jafri, marked the opening of the NCA Auditorium on 12 June.

But Dr Murtaza Jafri was not around in town to sit idle and get himself confined to a chair in a well appointed office, embroiled in the paper work. He quickly engaged with the French Embassy in Islamabad and arranged an art exhibition on the Embassy premises a couple of days ahead of the ‘Bastille Day’, the French National Day.

The works of the NCA students were displayed in the exhibition and a jury also picked some prize winners, who were awarded at the French National Day reception held at a local hotel on July 14.

Meanwhile, the NCA Principal launched first training workshop for amateur artists in which as many as 30 boys and girls and men and women, aged between 16 years to 45 years, participated. There were some Pakistan Air Force (PAF) officials, students from different universities and institutions and even a few housewives participated. The painting group in the workshop, which was held in two sessions of three days each, consisted of 7 members, the drawing group consisted of 16 members while the graphic design group had 7 participants.

The first session was held from July 5 to 7 and the second from July 13 to 15. And the works of the participants of this workshop were displayed in the new NCA gallery on July 15. And one must concede that the end result was not all that bad at all!

Dr Murtaza Jafri was indeed pleased to have the building to promote NCA’s projects and he was most excited about the existence of a modern and well equipped 450 seat capacity auditorium.

“This auditorium would be used for screening the films being produced by the young groups, stage dramas, arrange theatre shows and hold musical events. This will provide an opportunity to the youngsters to come forth and get a chance to show their works to the public, something which they don’t have right now,” Dr Murtaza Jafri said while talking to ‘The News’. He said that the ‘Film Department’ of the NCA, established about 12 years ago, is rearing to take off and their first production is likely to hit the cine screens very soon.

“I have every intention to make this building a vibrant place bustling with art, film, drama, theatre and music activities for the general public to enjoy and appreciate. There are all the diplomatic missions based here in the federal capital and each mission has a cultural section. We will develop close coordination with them and we hope it would help infuse a new culture of art, culture, film and music coordination with them in this place,” the NCA Principal said.