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Contemporary Art Gallery

555 Nelson Street
Vancouver, Canada
Open from Tuesday to
Sunday 12 pm → 6 pm

Admission always free
ArchiveExhibition
24 Jul 20until3 Jan 21

Madiha Aijaz

Memorial for the lost pages

Alvin Balkind Gallery and offsite at Yaletown-Roundhouse Station

A photograph of a train employee in a train vestibule. They wear a green uniform with gold insignia and a grey wool hat. They look down, away from the camera, while light from a window glows behind.

Madiha Aijaz, A Railway Pilgrimage in Pakistan (detail), 2014.

Memorial for the lost pages presents the intimate videos and photographs of Madiha Aijaz, bringing together the artist’s works in Canada for the first time. Aijaz was based in Karachi, Pakistan, and her work is as complex and layered as the city in which she lived, addressing issues of language and identity, longing and loss, public space and colonial legacies. Her videos explore Karachi’s historic and mostly deserted public libraries. Alongside these works are a series of photographs that examine tensions between awaking desire and admissible sexuality in, as Aijaz described, “contested, often fractured landscapes.” Offsite at Yaletown-Roundhouse Station, another photographic series describes the country’s most famous rail line, the Khyber Mail. Together, Aijaz’s photographs and videos call attention to shared spaces that are seemingly peripheral to contemporary life. They languish from a neglect that threatens their continued existence. Yet, as the artist’s steadfast and often tender camerawork suggests, these spaces persist.

Co-curated by Kimberly Phillips and Zarmeene Shah

This exhibition is presented in partnership with Capture Photography Festival. Work at Yaletown-Roundhouse Station is presented in partnership with the Canada Line Public Art Program, InTransit BC.

Biographies

Madiha Aijaz was a filmmaker and photographer based in Karachi, Pakistan. Her book on Hindu temples, Call to Conscience, was published in 2014. Recent exhibitions include the Karachi Biennale, Pakistan (2017); 10th International Documentary & Short Film Festival of Kerala, Thiruvananthapuram, India (2017); IAWRT Asian Women’s Film Festival, New Delhi (2015); and Urban Flux Film Festival, Johannesburg (2012). Aijaz was an Assistant Professor at the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture and received an MFA in Photography from Parsons with a Fulbright Scholarship.

Zarmeene Shah is an independent curator and critic currently based in Karachi, Pakistan. Focusing on contemporary art and continental and semiotic theory, she is particularly interested in new media, the body, and the political in art. Shah attained an undergraduate degree in Fine Art from the Indus Valley School of Art & Architecture in Karachi, followed by an MA in Critical & Curatorial Studies from Columbia University as a Fulbright Scholar (2010). She was Curator-at-Large for the Karachi Biennale in 2017, and also currently serves as Head of the Liberal Arts Program at the Indus Valley School of Art & Architecture.

Seven framed photographs and two monitors hang on two gallery walls. The left wall has two monitors and three photographs, the right wall has four photographs. Two benches sit in front.
Four framed photographs and two monitors hang on two walls. The left wall has one photograph and the right wall has three photographs and two monitors. One bench sits in the middle of the room.
Four framed photographs and one monitor hang on two walls. On the left wall there are four framed photographs, on the right wall there is one monitor. Two benches sit in the middle of the room.
Four framed photographs hang horizontally on the wall of the gallery. Three photographs are grouped together on the right, the fourth sits alone on the left. The frames of the photographs are white.

Documents

Program guidepdf1mbExhibition materialpdf705kb

Talks & Events

EventVideo VisitsSummer 2020
3 Jan 21
A portrait photograph of Zarmeene Shah. She has a long brown hair and is wearing a black shirt. She smiles directly at the camera. Event · OnlineCuratorial Lecturewith Zarmeene Shah
28 Apr 21·5:30 PM
A photograph of a train employee in a train vestibule. They wear a green uniform with gold insignia and a grey wool hat. They look down, away from the camera, while light from a window glows behind.
Seven framed photographs and two monitors hang on two gallery walls. The left wall has two monitors and three photographs, the right wall has four photographs. Two benches sit in front.
Four framed photographs and two monitors hang on two walls. The left wall has one photograph and the right wall has three photographs and two monitors. One bench sits in the middle of the room.
Four framed photographs and one monitor hang on two walls. On the left wall there are four framed photographs, on the right wall there is one monitor. Two benches sit in the middle of the room.
Four framed photographs hang horizontally on the wall of the gallery. Three photographs are grouped together on the right, the fourth sits alone on the left. The frames of the photographs are white.