Ujala Khan and M4HK intertwine aesthetic beauty with conceptual depth, creating multi-layered art that navigates history and identity. In the proc
Ujala Khan and M4HK intertwine aesthetic beauty with conceptual depth, creating multi-layered art that navigates history and identity.
In the process of visually decoding, and then developing an appreciation of Ujala Khan’s and M4HK’s works, we are reminded of V. N. Volosinov’s intricate theories in linguistics and poetics, where language serves not merely as a means of communication, but as a tool for shaping reality itself. Just as words hold the power to evoke, transform, and cultivate meaning, these contemporary artists wield their aesthetic practice to navigate the immaterial spaces of intention, subjectivity, and historical continuity. Their oeuvre is a highly productive exploration of the evolution of aesthetic purpose, and in many ways traces how artists in the 21st century situate themselves in dialogue with purely aesthetic concerns.
Historically, art’s value was often defined by its aesthetic attributes—beauty, composition, and mastery of form. However, as modernity progressed, a significant rupture occurred, with artists such as Marcel Duchamp and the movements of Dada, Surrealism, and Abstract Expressionism shifting the conversation from aesthetic beauty to conceptual intention. This radical recontextualization opened a new chapter where the ‘idea’ became as powerful as the ‘object,’ and the relationship between art and language became a defining feature of contemporary artistic practice.
Today, as this tension between aesthetic form and conceptual intention remains central to many
artists’ work, Ujala Khan and M4HK persuade the viewer not only to witness the aesthetic beauty of their work but also to interrogate the conceptual frameworks beneath the surface. We are invited to review for ourselves, in a wholly positivist manner, the notion of beauty, functionality, and the relevance of form in a world saturated with meaning and symbols. Both artists engage with a prodigious variety of materials and it would not be out of place to say that they have become virtuosos in their genre. From perforated metal panels to silver and gold foil, from acrylic paints to oils, nothing is left out of their purview; and very tellingly, a maddening diversity of glitter, sparkle, reflective plastics, beads and metals all embedded in vast layers of clear resin are just par for the course for them.
In adhering to the thematics established by Babar Moghal, each piece within the exhibition navigated the fragile boundary between the visible and the invisible, the said and the unsaid. It must be said that both artists focus on materiality and the tactility of the materials, engaging directly with how surfaces, textures, and structures might invoke sensual responses. In these works, the eye is led to marvel at the luminous possibilities of the material itself, and most importantly, how colour, form, and texture can be harnessed into an experience that is felt before it is understood.
The artists also approach the aesthetic from a conceptual lens, where intention becomes a luminous force, guiding not only the creation of the work but also its interaction with the viewer. Indeed, given that these artists live and work primarily in Lahore and Islamabad, these works possibly embodied Volosinov’s assertion that language and meaning (themselves definite structural components of visual art) are deeply social and ideological; they invite the viewer to observe how the narratives we construct around art are intertwined with the politics of identity, space, and history.
Ujala Khan’s works epitomise the caveat that some artworks are best seen physically since pictures simply do not do them an injustice. In the works titled Reclamation and Ambush (mixed media on canvas), there was a brilliantly balanced distribution of detailed abstract areas demarcated with intricate boundaries, interspersed with small resin-encased organic structures reminiscent of exotic shimmering biological organisms. These inclusions represent an ability to be both daring and experimental with the internal story-telling properties of her chosen materials.
The key, in keeping with our reference to Volosinov and his theories of language, to literally
experiencing Khans canvases is to be found in the surreal works of poets such as Paul Eluard
and Robert Desnos; the textures and shapes she creates can be read as scintillating
commentaries of their hyper-referential concatenations of ideas and images, a strategy that
lends itself to the verbal art of making things strange, precisely to imbue them with
delightful lyricism.
Again, the Bakhtin Circle’s theories of contemporaneity and polyphonic structures (Volosinov was a member of the circle, in fact) provide a nuanced understanding of literature and art as dynamic, multi-voiced fields. Central to their thinking is the concept of ‘dialogism’, a framework introduced by Mikhail Bakhtin to explain how meaning is generated not in isolation, but through constant interaction between different voices, ideas, and perspectives. In this view, language and meaning are inherently social and relational. Every utterance or artistic expression responds to previous ones while anticipating future responses. This continuous dialogue creates an open-ended and evolving space of meaning.
The above passage characterises M4HK’s works, as it singularly foregrounds the same multiplicity of voices and perspectives that shape meaning, and which emphasise the possibility that no single interpretation can fully encapsulate the complexity of a work. This approach encourages a more participatory, open-ended engagement with art, where meaning is not fixed but is continually being renegotiated through the dialogue between artist, artwork, and audience.
In the Musawe diptych and Vowels, space and time, this strategy is unreservedly played out in a plenitude of resin, beads and pieces of jewellery delectably strewn into box frames. Ujala Khan and M4HK demonstrate an immensely contemporary sensibility, far beyond most of their peers, as their works here strongly foreground this tension between aesthetics and intention which remains a vibrant force within the Pakistani cultural landscape, and as artists, they continue to “grow grapes by the luminosity of the word day” – a metaphor for the fruits of artistic labour – by harnessing the darakhshandagi of ideas, words, and vision in the broad daylight of contemporary practice. In this way, theirs was not just an exhibition of art objects but rather, a meditation on the evolving relationship between the sensory and the symbolic, inviting viewers to see how their artistic practices both reflect and shape the world in which it is embedded.
To conclusively apply an evaluative statement to these artists’ practices, one may borrow closely from P. N. Sakulin who states: What most characterises aesthetic communication is the fact that it is wholly absorbed in the creation of a work of art, and further, it’s continuous generative impulse in creating contemplators who are then able to renew their understanding of art
