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February 2003 New York- Bose Pacia Gallery presents a solo exhibition of new work by Talha Rathore from February 6 through March 22, 2003. The gallery is located at 508 West 26th Street on the 11th Floor, in the Chelsea district of New York City. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 12 - 6 pm and by appointment. There will be an opening reception on Thursday, February 6th from 6 to 8pm. The public is invited.
Using the ancient Pakistani tradition of miniature painting in which she was formally trained, Rathore creates works of art that address difficult questions of identity, dichotomy and diaspora with simple elegance. To conflate the meticulous technique of a revered artistic practice with the New York City subway map – a disposable, mass-produced item regularly torn apart and trampled – seems an act of heresy. Yet in the skillful hands of the artist, this merging of disparate elements produces a delicate equilibrium.
Smaller, intimate works with crimson edges and punctured, tea-stained surfaces betray the turmoil of the urban city. The colorful tangle of subway lines hold the promise of countless destinations and innumerable means of reaching each one – paralleling an existence between worlds where identity and location of self are continuously in transit. Amid the confusion of the bustling cosmopolitan, a tree serenely emerges from the center of each work. Whether cypress or palm or plantain, the exquisitely rendered organic forms make reference to femininity and fertility. Yet one is compelled to ponder the nature of such allusions for although emblematic of quiet fortitude and the unerring strength of roots, each tree is bound and confined in isolation.
The tree - the cypress in particular – assumes a dominant role in the larger works as well. Here the form is duplicated, multiplied, altered and arranged to establish systems of dynamic exchange. Whether in conflict or concert, the abstracted forms become figurative icons deliberately aligned to raise questions of coexistence. Using the collage combination of subway map and wasli (handmade paper) again as the support for her intricate brushwork, Rathore draws upon vibrant colors, gold leaf and block printing to enhance her compositions further. In spite of the array of media and the multiple dichotomies present in each work, symmetry and simplicity are continually preserved in her art. To dwell comfortably between worlds is to embrace the notion of the dialectic – that the confrontation of opposing ideas necessarily leads to synthesis.
Born in Lahore, Pakistan, Talha Rathore studied miniature painting at the College of Fine Arts and graduated with a BFA in 1995. The artist was a resident at the Sanskriti Kala Kendra in New Delhi in 1997, after which she exhibited her works at Galerie Espace, also in New Delhi. Currently based in Queens, New York, Rathore has gone on to participate in prestigious exhibitions worldwide and her work is in numerous private collections. This is her first solo exhibition with Bose Pacia.