You Who Are My Love and My Life’s Enemy Too

One of Imran Qureshi’s large scale works. This series was initiated by Qureshi after a terror attack at a marketplace near his home in Lahore, Pakistan. The images of blood on the electronic media, post the attack was the genesis of this scarlet hued painting. His earlier abstract work had been deeply meditative with the gestural action of leakage and seepage. After this event, Qureshi used violent gestural abstraction in layers to create blood like marks on paper. If one observes closely, miniature imagery is also apparent within this work as elaborate foliate patterns from historic Basholi and Kangra miniature paintings. Qureshi is equally comfortable with his forays into abstract expressionism while creating his large-scale installations as well as large scale paintings such as these, where foliate patterns are created using the gestural flow of action painting. The foliate vocabulary emerging from the blood-like marks are symbols of hope in Qureshi’s own words. This seminal work lead to the creation of the installation 'Blessings upon the Land of My Love’. Qureshi was awarded the Jury Prize for this work at The Sharjah Biennial in 2011. Qureshi is still exploring these themes in his new works and his installations to date.

Awards: This is a large scale work which was a finalist for the Signature Art Prize in Singapore in 2010.

Exhibitions: The Rising Tide Exhibition at the Mohatta Palace Museum in 2009 and The Signature Art Prize Exhibition in Singapore in 2010.

Published: Imran Qureshi, The Monograph in 2013, The Rising Tide Exhibition Catalogue in 2009 and The Signature Art Prize Catalogue, published by the Singapore Art Museum in 2010.