Artist Hiba Schahbaz | A Contemporary pakistani Painter | ArtLiveAndBeauty

 

Hiba Schahbaz's Paintings

Hiba Schahbaz is a Pakistani-American painter who was born in 1981. Schahbaz was born in the Pakistani city of Karachi. She is well-known for her modern paintings that are reminiscent of classical traditions. Hiba Schahbaz obtained his MFA from the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn after studying as a miniaturist painter at the National College of Arts in Lahore, Pakistan. She began her painting career with a series of small paintings, subsequently progressing to bigger scale works.

"The basic premise of my work is a self-portrait," says artist Hiba Schahbaz. I am a South Asian woman, a native of a traditional, primarily Muslim country; in my works, I explore with issues relating to my multidimensional identity in the context of modern society and the fields into which I have ventured, maturing as an artist and relocating from Pakistan to New York. Every step I take as an artist is a step toward independence, and I'm not worried with matching the market's or the art world's expectations. Having abandoned a life in which I attempted to manage myself in order to conform to norms that I did not meet, I believe I can no longer do this to myself. I attempt to keep the worries that have kept me from participating in and sharing my work in the past from impacting my present.
I am both an artist and a model in my works. I photograph my physique and use the photographs as references for my paintings. I reflect on what it means to be a woman through the stories I write. By presenting the beauty, fragility, and strength of the female body, my works explore concerns of personal freedom, destruction, sexuality, and censorship. I employ a female character to tell a narrative that transcends cultural and political borders. I share my own tale, enhancing it with metaphor and creativity. And, while I am the major character in the works, they have a parallel, existential significance. "I frequently utilise the feminine body as a vehicle to depict thoughts and worries from the sociocultural and political arenas."