Connections and conversations around Southasian art  in Kathmandu

Reflections on discussions with Southasian artists and educators Salima Hashmi and Rashid Rana in Kathmandu at the Triennale Conversations Series 2026 and a Southasian artists’ exhibition organised by a regional organisation

By Abishek Budhathoki / Sapan News

Two of Pakistan’s most influential artistic voices were in Kathmandu recently, enriching discussions at the Kathmandu Triennale 2026 conversations series – Salima Hashmi, a pioneering art educator and cultural chronicler, and Rashid Rana, a transformative visual artist.

Representing distinct generational perspectives across nearly three decades, they embody two pivotal moments in Southasia’s artistic journey. 

Both were in Kathmandu to participate in conversations organised in collaboration with the Nepal Academy of Fine Arts (NAFA) and Siddhartha Gallery. The latter also hosted a South Asia Art Exhibition organized by the South Asia Foundation, showcasing works by 33 artists from across the region – Nepal, India, Afghanistan, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh.

The participating artists are alumni from Beaconhouse National University in Lahore, enabled by South Asia Foundation scholarships to attend college in a ‘foreign’ country, Pakistan. Hashmi served as the founding Dean of the Mariam Dawood School of Visual Art and Design at BNU and was earlier Professor of Fine Art at the National College of Arts, Lahore, where she later also served as Principal.

A dream

The late Madanjeet Singh, who founded the South Asia Foundation was “an amazing person who decided to put one of his dreams in place,” Hashmi told Sapan News. 

“And the dream was peace in Southasia, creativity in Southasia, economic prosperity in Southasia.”

She herself has a long-standing commitment to regional peace and artistic exchange, as exemplified by her role as a founding member of the Southasia Peace Action Network and her position on the advisory committee.

Hashmi and Rana share a distinguished institutional lineage as former deans of Beaconhouse National University, a pivotal institution recognized for reshaping artistic practices in the region.

A painter, professor, and activist, Salima Hashmi brings a multifaceted perspective to regional dialogue. As the eldest daughter of legendary poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz, she carries forward not only her father’s legacy of cultural resistance but also represents a generation that witnessed the region’s transformation from colonial subjugation to cultural self-determination.

Hashmi’s personal journey mirrors the seismic shifts in Southasia’s artistic landscape over the past eight decades. 

When I first arrived at the school, there were merely four female students in the class. Now, as you visit National College of Arts, women students have surpassed men in numbers,” she reflects, situating these demographic shifts within what she aptly terms “the woman’s millennium.”

“We were coming out from two things,” she explains. “Firstly, the effects of colonialism and secondly, the effects of a great political cleavage, which is accompanied by trauma, in which millions were displaced.”

Through her distinguished tenure as professor and dean at the National College of Arts and her subsequent role as founding dean at BNU, Hashmi has developed an educational philosophy that emphasizes individual exploration while acknowledging collective histories. 

“The teacher’s role is to facilitate the student to help them form their own questions, to help them become curious,” she explains, describing an approach that has influenced generations of artists across Southasia.

Her perspective on cultural heritage offers a dynamic framework for contemporary artists: “Artists live in their own time certainly in their DNA in the memories that their parents had in their grandparents. These are the building blocks of new art and of contemporary art.”

Catalyst for change

The potential for art to foster regional dialogue remains central to Hashmi’s vision, particularly relevant in an era of increasing global divisions. 

“I want to do it in the context of art because if you do it in the cultural context, some void becomes more palatable,” she argues, noting how artistic exchange can transcend political barriers.

Hashmi maintains a nuanced view shaped by decades of observation: “I don’t believe art by itself creates social change. But what it can do is to increase awareness that can lead to social change.” 

This reflects her long experience in navigating the role of art in social transformation, from the political upheavals of the 1960s to contemporary social movements.

“What better place than Nepal, which is neutral, which gives all of us a visa on arrival… says welcome,” Hashmi observes. 

This accessibility creates what she describes as moments of profound connection: “When Pakistani students come here, when Nepali go there, there is a sense of eureka. This is different. And yet, oh, this is familiar. That’s a word I know, that’s music I know.”

And yet, it speaks volumes for the lack of regional integration in Southasia that Hashmi and Rana both had to make the journey from Lahore to Kathmandu via a circuitous route – transitioning in the Middle East – because there are no direct flights between Pakistan and Nepal. 

In a thoughtfully curated conversation moderated by writer, art-historian, filmmaker Sophia L. Pandé, Rashid Rana offered insights into his artistic journey and vision. Born in 1968 in Lahore, where he continues to live and work, Rana’s trajectory from the NCA – Hashmi was one of his teachers – to the Massachusetts College of Art and Design has shaped his perspective on global artistic dialogue. 

Rana’s coming of age and emerging as an artist in the late 1980s coincided with digital awakening and cultural transformation, followed by the rapid globalization of the 1990s, Drawing on both his generational perspective and global experience, Rana challenges these prescriptive narratives, rejecting the notion that artists from developing nations must perpetually represent a romanticized or essentialized cultural essence.

Transformative

Both emphasize the importance of creating dynamic, evolving spaces of critical engagement rather than static repositories of knowledge. 

Their shared philosophy focuses on nurturing environments that support non-conventional outcomes and foster individual creative expression beyond traditional boundaries.

“Art,” for Rana, is not a fixed category but a fluid, historically contingent condition. This perspective liberates artistic expression from the restrictive boundaries of cultural, political, and geographic demarcations. Rana is now preparing a new generation of artists to navigate the complex global cultural landscape while maintaining connections to their cultural roots.

Rana’s work represents a sophisticated form of cultural diplomacy that operates outside traditional diplomatic channels. His art becomes a medium of dialogue, transcending the political antagonisms that have historically divided Pakistan and India. 

As Rana himself emphasizes, “language is the real meaning of the work.”

His groundbreaking works “All Eyes Skyward during the Annual Parade” and “Ommatidia” (2004) offer powerful visual commentaries on Southasian identity, borders and nationalism and how communities understand and preserve their collective past.

Perhaps most compelling is Rana’s belief in the transformative potential of young minds in urban centers of developing regions. He argues that these emerging creative practitioners possess an inherent “panoramic view of contemporaneity” — a perspective unburdened by the historical baggage that often constraints more established artistic traditions.

These conversations in Kathmandu represent a microcosm of potential, a momentary crystallization of what Southasian cultural dialogue can represent: A continuous, evolving conversation that celebrates differences while acknowledging fundamental interconnectedness. 

Art emerges as a sanctuary of mutual recognition, where shared histories and diverse futures converge in meaningful dialogue.

Abishek Budhathoki is a filmmaker and critic based in Kathmandu, Nepal. A contributor to the Nepali Times, he writes on cinema with an emphasis on its cultural and political dimensions. He holds a degree in Journalism specializing in media, mass culture, and cinema theory.

LEAD IMAGE: Visitors at the South Asia Art Exhibition, Siddhartha Gallery, Kathmandu, December 5, 2024. Photo: Siddhartha Gallery.

This is a Sapan News syndicated feature available for republication with due credit http://www.sapannews.com.

Note on Southasia as one word: We use ‘Southasia’ as one word, “seeking to restore some of the historical unity of our common living space, without wishing any violence on the existing nation states” – Himal Southasian.

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