Bilal Ahmed

Bilal Ahmed (b.1994) is a visual artist based in Karachi Pakistan. He received his BFA degree from the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture in 2022. He has recently exhibited works at numerous emerging artists groups shows including Sambara Art Gallery and Alhamra Art Gallery. He has also exhibited at public spaces and collective exhibitions like the Garmi project at Cinema 73 and The Sanctuary Art Gallery. Born in Saudi Arabia, Ahmed incorporates a variety of techniques and mediums in his practice , ranging from drawing, sculpture, painting to performance art. As a consequence of this , he has been a part of a variety of performance art pieces as well. Some of them include a solo performance at the exhibition as we play beneath the warmth of an alien Sun by the New Art Gallery Walsall, February 2023, Jagah Hai, a group show curated by Amin Gulgee, Sara Pagganwala and Adam Fahy, October 2022, group show I whispered and pulsated within the waves curated by Natasha Jozi as part of Karachi Biennale 2019. He was also the recipient of an award at the Artfest 2023 Karachi.

As I navigate my way through the caverns of a hustling bustling city, I reflect upon different heirchy of people, engaged and enthralled in acts of mundanity. They exist in a realm of their own, fulfilling the requirements of existence. It is in the entanglement of people, their activities, interactions and responses that I build my practice. As my own physical self meanders in between and around them, the differences and similarities of our physicality helps to develop metaphorical nuances , upon which my visuals are birthed. My practice involves a dynamic play of material, which produces a generative body of work spanning sculpture, painting, drawing, printmaking, video, and installation while always addressing the precarious nature of materiality and grappling with matters of entropy and temporality. As a consequence ,the invented forms are created through layered processes of accumulation, removal, and juxtaposition—gestures that I would like to describe as “more functional than artistic.” I am intrigued by the sexual, physical , metaphysical and cognitive changes adopted by people to adapt for survival. The acceptance and rejection of bodies within the parameters of a world that is dominated by an allure of the perfect body arouses my interest. As a differently abled person, cohabiting and existing becomes the precipice of my observation and lends largely to my visual construction.