Acclaimed painter Masood Kohari passes away

LAHORE: Internationally recognised painter Masood Kohari passed away in Rouen (France) on Wednesday morning. According to his family, Kohari was in his 80s. In 1969 Kohari immigrated to France and started living in Rouen. Since then, he had split his time between Pakistan and France.

He gained fame in Karachi art scene in the 1950s, when he and his close friend Jamil Naqsh created the foundation for a national cultural awakening.In that era, in Karachi the contemporary artists such as Shahid Sajjad, Maqsood Ali, Mansoor Aye, and many others from former East Pakistan were encountering obstacles but were still building a name for themselves in a variety of disciplines.

At the age of 25 Kohari started his profession’s journey with oil paintings.At the Pakistan-American Cultural Centre, he had presented a solo show. Nasir Shamsie, an art critic, said although he was primarily self-taught, he had ‘the talents and sensitivity of a natural-born artist’.

Later, Kohari became fixated on clay, which inspired him to experiment with the novel media. He quickly earned the reputation of being a Pakistani ceramics pioneer. Two hundred of his pieces were featured in shows in Paris and Normandy due to his success in the new field. He was a man who could not live on the same place for a long time. He went to Punjab in quest of local clay artisanal practices, which took him to Gujrat and Gujranwala.

He made new ground here. He abandoned the oppressively lush surroundings of northern France and labored alongside regional craftspeople in the sweltering heat of pottery kilns. During this procedure, Kohari honed his skills in creating glass and metal pieces that would eventually become known as his “Fire Collages” or “Crystal Collages.