Outset India in association with India Art Fair 2013 and The Aman, New Delhi, supported IAF Breakfast Series 2013’s 20 Questions, a conversation between Hameed Haroon, Rashid Rana, and Frances Morris and also 20 questions, Barbara London in conversation with William Kentridge, concerning art practices across the globe.
Hameed Haroon is CEO of Pakistan Herald Publicatins (Pvt) Limited, printers and publishers of DAWN, the leading English language newspaper from Pakistan. He has served as the five-time President elect of the All Pakistan Newspapers Society. He was instrumental in setting up Dawn News – Pakistan’s first English language news channel – and has contributed significantly to the development of popular radio in Pakistan. He was awarded the Sitara-e-Imtiaz, Pakistan’s highest civil award in 2004 in recognition for his contribution to promote art and culture. He was the co-curator of The Holy Sinner, a major retrospective of the non-calligraphic works of Sadequain who is Pakistan’s most well known and prolific artist. In 2004, he curated the exhibition entitled Jewel in the Crown – Karachi under the Raj 1843-1947. Mr. Haroon has one of the largest private collections of paintings and books in Pakistan as well as rare maps, textiles, and furniture.
Over the last nineteen years, the practice of Rashid Rana has taken on dramatically different modes such as paintings, stainless steel structures, video installation, photo-sculptures, and photo mosaics. Today he is a globally recognized artist having had solo and group shows at venues including New York Exchange, Singapore Art Museum, Hong Kong Art Centre, Cornerhouse, Lisson Gallery, Musee Guimet, Fotomuseum, Whitechapel Gallery, Saatchi Gallery, Lower Belvedere, Asia Society, National Fine Arts Museum, House of World Cultures, Institute of the Modern Art, Brisbane. Born in 1968, Rana lives, works, and teaches in Lahore.
Francis Morris is Head of collections (International Art) at Tate Modern. She has curated many exhibitions in her life and for her, there are two ways in which an exhibition can come about: one is as a culmination of intense study and interest, the other is as a result of insatiable curiosity.
William Kentrige is a South African artist best known for his prints, drawings, and animated films. These are constructed by filming a drawing, making erasures and changes, and filming it again. He continues this process meticulously, giving each change to the drawing a quarter of a second to two seconds’ screen time. A single drawing will be altered and filmed this way until the end of a scene. These palimpsest like drawings are later displayed along with the films as finished pieces of art. Kentridge’s work is heavily context-dependent given he is from South Africa, where until the 1990s people of colour were second-class citizens under apartheid. Kentridge is of European descent, and as such has a unique position as a third-party observer. Aspects of social injustice that have transpired over the years in South Africa have often acted as fodder for Kentridge’s pieces.
Barbara London is curator at The Museum of Modern Art’s media exhibition and collection programs and has guided them over a long pioneering career. Her recent activity includes Through the Weeping Glass with Quay Brothers at the Mutter Museum; and MoMA Soundings (2013); Looking at Music 3.0, exploring the influence of music on contemporary art practices, focusing on New York in the 1980s and 1990s.
