Waqas Khan - Buch / Katalog (Art Book Shop)

WAQAS KHAN
born in Akhtarabad, Pakistan in 1982, lives and works in Lahore.

Khan is influenced by the delicate Bardhakhat procedure, based on the traditional Persian Mughal miniature painting. Transforming the traditional practice of miniature painting into a contemporary context, Khan applies millions of tiny dots, lines and stripes meticulously to the paper with a dowel, usually used by architects for technical drafting. "In my work I challenge miniature painting and at the same time leave it open for discussion." The result appears as a fusion of different media: from the distance one experiences the artwork being a print, going closer seeing that the fine structure not beeing printed but made by hand. The focus of Khans art lays on the emotional and spiritual connection to the observer: „I want the viewer to actually look at the works and through my work I want to evoke a dialogue between the viewer and the work. It´s all about assimilating from outside to inside and letting the outside image enter inside you.“ The final product is akin to a visual narration, which should be read and explored by the spectator.

To approach the oeuvre of Waqas Khan is to discover an existential statement that is at once decisive and delicate; to sense a truth that is deep, convincing and subtle. In his drawings we perceive the strength of a will that hopes to leave a mark on the existential space we all share and that opens us up to the awareness of the passing of time. These compositions have been defined as minimalist, and yet they do not match the rigid aesthetic of the industrial serialisation that lies at the origin of the name. In Waqas Khan's visual narratives, syntax is  based on repetitions and series of similar though unique signs connected by pauses, breaks and rhythms that are absolutely organic. These precise signs appear as his studio is gradually permeated by solitude and the silence of night. This is when the artist, as a medium, contributes to the flow of the élan vital that springs from his thoughts and emotions. His individual rhythms end up configuring maps in which the viewer will play an active role, striking up a dialogue between equals in a game of mirror reflections. (Galerie Krinzinger 2021).