Vulgarity and art in Pakistan on August 22, 2018Anyone who has seen those hilarious Punjabi theater plays or has passed around the cinemas near Lakshmi Chowk in Lahore knows what vulgarity is. Or at least what it has evolved to be considered as. Vladimir Nabakov put it like this – nothing is more exhilarating than philistine vulgarity. Maybe this intellectual elitism is itself […]
Reconnecting South Asia through art on August 21, 2018Sonal Khullar, an art historian based in the US, discusses art, artists and culture in South Asia today. How did this trip to Lahore change your perception of Amrita Shergill? She is a really significant artist and in some ways has been overlooked in the art historical genealogy. So in the last twenty years, there […]
Irfan Khoosat, Tajdar Zaidi and Sarmad Khoosat give life to classic Urdu texts on August 20, 2018The performance room of Olomopolo had a houseful again and this time it was a joyous occasion. Olomopolo celebrated its fifth birthday at the Olo Junction in Muslim Town Lahore by organising a reading of literary texts in Urdu. In the center of the performance area were three sofas, complete with cushions. The side tables […]
Trolls bullying women should face strict legal action: Zohair Toru on August 15, 2018Zohair Toru came in the public eye in 2011 when he gave an interview to a private news channel d uring a protest organised by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI). The interview showed a young student in sunglasses and spikes saying contradictory things like “police humein maregi tu hum inqilaab kaise lainge?” (If the police beat […]
Pakistan’s first standup comedy show by drag queens was a runaway success on August 13, 2018Chatni entered the room in purple Marathi sari and the song “Fevicol se” started blaring from the music system. Her dance moves were unabashedly sexual. The saree and the pallu only made the performance more sensual. The audience was immediately in a trance. She seemed completely at ease with her dress, her purple extensions and […]
Systematic injustice against Bangali Media on August 12, 2018Shahid ul Alam, an internationally acclaimed photojournalist from Dhaka, known for his criticism of the current government was abducted from his home last week. Later that day he was produced in the court where he told reporters that he had been tortured. He was being interrogated for “giving false information to different media outlets and […]
Remembrance by things past on August 12, 2018Aanchal Malhotra is a Delhi-based writer and artist who has vowed to document the partition through objects left behind. Her first book, Remnants of a Saparation, is a seminal work that peers into the Indian Partition through the objects migrants took with them. These migrants settled in different parts of India and what is now […]
Reimagining post-partition Punjab on August 9, 2018Pippa Virdee’s book From Ashes of 1947: Reimagining Punjab deals with every theme a Punjabi is often concerned with when it comes to the 1947 partition and the ensuing migration, refugee crisis and resettlement. The book also deals with the Punjabi language’s decline, the miscarriage of the partition plan and the innumerable women that suffered […]
The separated twins of the sub-continent on August 8, 2018The first time I visited Amritsar, I was bewildered, smitten and deeply saddened. It was in 2008, exactly ten years ago on a trip with my college, Kinnaird. We reached Amritsar from Delhi, after visiting other major towns of north India. My paternal grandfather, who raised me, was from the eastern Punjab district of Gurdaspur, […]
Welcoming ‘Jeebho Jaani’ to Lahore on August 7, 2018How long has it been since you last saw a children’s play in Lahore being performed in Punjabi? Some of us were lucky enough to experience it this weekend. The play ‘Jeebho Jaani Di Kahani’ was presented by the Olomopolo media on Saturday and Sunday evenings at the Alhamra Arts Council Lahore. The play was […]