Bonding with earth by Sana Ghias Habib

Bonding with earth

by Sana Ghias Habib

Mian Salahuddin's life seems to have been much like his pieces on show -- hard and cold to the touch, but organic and sublime in spirit

It is not often that one reads a book about an eminent personality, especially one related to the arts, from cover to cover in one sitting. It is even rarer, that one emerges from such a reading, with the sense that one has just walked with another as he lived, ate, breathed, created, shouted and vented, whether in agony or in ecstasy. 'Born of Fire', Noorjehan Bilgrami's book accompanying Mian Salahuddin's recent Retrospective at Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture, Karachi allows you to do just that. It brings Mian Salahuddin to life.
It is not, as we discover, the happiest of lives. Many of the anecdotes recounted by the contributors recall Mian's fear of shadows, people, and doctors. Almost every piece touches upon his father's brutal murder as one of the main events shaping Mian's life and character. They discuss his estrangement from almost all of his nine siblings. They talk about his harsh attitude towards his students -- only those who had 'Herculean strength and the patience of Job' got through his courses. He is described variously as a complete contradiction -- modest yet arrogant, loving yet impatient and abrupt, scrupulously fussy yet given to impulse. Probably the most infamous story associated with Mian refers to the incident before he left NCA for the US on a Fulbright Scholarship, when he smashed several valuable pieces in a fit of rage, directed, it seems, at no one in particular.
But through the sadness and the severity emerges immense beauty: Of the man himself -- his immaculate office, the care he took over his personal appearance, his health and fitness; and his dedication to achieving perfect harmony between aesthetic balance and creative purpose, within his chosen medium -- the earth with which he played when he was a little boy in the village of Kasur. Mian grew up on a farm and clearly felt a strong connection with clay. His bond with the material is evident in the presence his pieces embody. It is not difficult to describe his pieces. They are, in their own particular ways, alive. They seem less like decorative or utilitarian items, and more like sprites -- watchful, guarded, willing to unfurl their secrets, but only to those who care to wait and wonder. Some are perfectly rounded, others perfectly gnarled. Some are dull with twirls that allow them to stretch and turn. Others are bright, electric blue on beige, or swirls of black on turquoise. Plates, perfectly asymmetrical, bowls, cones with wobbly, round bases, vases, teapots.
His signature vessels, tall and straight, bear the weight of Mian's mood as well as his aesthetic. Some stand simple and tall, a question mark stamped on them, while others have Urdu words running across. Some end in narrow mouths, while others morph wonderfully into organic shapes with lips wide open. The design element varies across their length and breadth. Some have strips of earth plastered along their length, and echo smooth, leathery warmth. Others are cool and grainy to the touch. There are also several amorphous pieces which look and feel like rocks in the sand, and yet, as you watch, morph into horses, fish, mountains, arms and limbs. And many more which seem to move and twirl with 'grotesque clay coils flowing out of them like tentacles.' Whether shiny blue and smooth, or deeply maroon and twisted with loopy, swirly edges, each piece bears the mark of the hand that moulded and loved the earth.
But while the earth nurtured him, the world it seems was cruel. Friends and family had to bear with an impatient, aloof aesthete. Students had to come up to the expectations of a sharp tongued perfectionist. Small wonder then that he was mostly left alone. One particularly poignant story is recounted about Mian's last day at NCA, where he studied and subsequently worked: 'For forty years Mian went to the National College of Arts without missing a day. Even on holidays he worked on campus and always arrived at the college before time. He was such an institution it was unimaginable to think of NCA without him, but regretfully the day came for his retirement. We witnessed him leaving his office which was his home away from home, and take his bicycle to the gate. It was April 1998 and sadly not one student, not one teacher, and not one colleague came to say goodbye, neither was there a farewell for him... Mian kept a brave face as we approached the arched gate, but he was terribly hurt.'
Mian Salahuddin's life seems to have been much like his pieces on show -- hard and cold to the touch, but organic and sublime in spirit. The pictures of Mian that we leaf through in Born of Fire are telling. They show him at his wheel, shaping and moulding his pieces, a smile playing on his lips.
Young and earnest in the earlier photos -- and then much older, more wary, more closed -- an evanescent sprite himself. But happy to sit amidst his pieces of earth. The very earth that gives us all life, and to which he managed, in some small measure, to return the favour.