Spaces Vol 1 Is 6

ART
for. “I realized that art gave me a feeling
of great liberation.” She went on to
complete her Bachelor in Fine Arts from
Lalit Kala Academy in 1992 and had her
first solo exhibition, ‘SAARC Girl Child
Decade’ at the Goethe Institute in 1990,
followed by ‘Women’, at the Srijana
Contemporary Art Gallery in 1993. In
the same year, ‘Wonderful Landscapes
of Nepal’ was exhibited at the J Art
Gallery. Ashmina then won a scholarship
to do BFA from the University of
Tasmania in Australia. With widening
exposure to the world, the latent rebel in
Ashmina seemed to be boiling over with
righteous anger at the unjust gender
inequality between the sexes back in her
own country.
Left above: Asmina’s installation art in
Durbar Square, Basantpur, expressing
the loss of identity and the bloodshed of
recent times.
Left below: Charcoal sketch on lokta
paper from the ‘Hair Warp’ series.
Anger, which gave birth to ‘Women and
Sensuality’ in 1998 which was exhibited
at the Kathmandu Art Gallery. One of
the organizers was architect Sarosh
Pradhan, an artist himself, and he
remembers, “Ashmina wanted to title the
exhibit, ‘Women and Sexuality’ but we
advised her that it would be more prudent
to use the term, ‘Sensuality’ rather than
‘Sexuality’.” Through this show, Ashmina
wanted to ‘express the feminine
perspective towards women’s sexuality’.
Some of the oils on canvas created quite
a stir-a profusion of blood red depicting
depths of stark womanhood. Other
canvases on display were lithographs
which were more complex in nature.
Ashmina claims to “have always been
influenced by nature…Human Nature,
Social Nature, Cultural Nature, Nature’s
Nature’ which provokes searching for
answers to the questions, ‘Who am I?
What am I? Where am I?’”. Ashmina
brings up an interesting point when she
says that people should be able to
understand the difference between skill
and creativity in an artist. “An artist may
be very accomplished, but it is creativity
which uplifts art to a transcendent level.”
According to ‘Gender and Globalism’
(Aomori Contemporary Art Centre/
24 SEP-OCT 2005 SPACES