Enlightening Entertainment
 
Love for Allah and Nature: Mr. Hanif Khan’s Art Gallery in Islamabad, Pakistan (In Urdu)      
Today’s Enlightening Entertainment will be presented in Urdu, with subtitles in Arabic, Aulacese (Vietnamese), Chinese, English, French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Mongolian, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and Thai.

Halo, beauty-loving viewers. Today, we go to the area of the famous the Lok Virsa Museum in Islamabad, the capital city of Pakistan. Also known as the Folk Heritage Museum, this famous preservation center of Pakistani culture is run by the National Institute of Folk & Traditional Heritage. Displayed are traditional architectural façades, statues, pictures, pottery, music and textile work. Along a colorful street, the talents of many artists are on display.

Here, we come to our destination, the art gallery of Pakistan’s renowned artist Mr. Hanif Khan. Mr. Khan is well-known, for his work in calligraphy as well as his mastery of blending the two art forms of painting and sculpture. Today, Mr. Khan has invited us to his art gallery to share his love and enthusiasm for art, nature, and spirituality.

My name is Hanif Ullah Khan, I do my work in water color usually on nature study, and I go to every place of Pakistan and other countries, and use my brush, my pencil, and my other things. You can see this is a place in Kashmir. From childhood, I got an education in the fine arts.

After that I have been an art lecturer in different universities. For this I have been wandering in different cities, places, and areas, and worked on the art of nature study. It’s inclusive of some historical places such as Muqli, some parts of Multan, and some areas of Balochistan and Punjab.

This is an area of Multan and this one is an area from Kashmir. And beside Mukri I studied in Sindh also, and also in the Karachi area of the sea. I have just studied the life of fish in that sea. I just show you that, you see, I worked on the water colors, because in this area the atmosphere for water colors is more suitable compared to this.

For this, I arranged exhibitions which are available in all art galleries in Pakistan and they keep on exhibiting. Almost 34 exhibitions have been done. Out of these, six to seven are solo exhibitions and others are group exhibitions.

I have gotten two to four awards from the Pakistani National Counsel and Pakistani Fine Art Association. Ghalib Baqar and Abdul Hai, they are the very best water colorists and do real-class work there, because they use their color and brush outdoors. They mostly work outdoors and mostly work on site, on site outdoors. They have spent their life on it, and I am much inspired by them.

Besides water color and the study of nature, Mr. Hanif Khan specializes in the art of calligraphy. He is a pioneer of bringing this sacred art of Islam into the modern art world. In his own unique style, he blends images of mosque architecture, colors of Islam such as turquoise, blue, and gold, and, of course, verses from the Qur’an.

I show you, you see, this is a calligraphy… And this is a geometrical shape in this, I make architectural shapes. This is the new style of calligraphy because when I have been visiting different places and inspired there from the architecture and nature, then in this you can see a natural effect. So what I did in this art is that I kept in mind the original calligraphic line and used that, because when I went outdoors for nature study, I saw the outdoor architecture and elements of paintings, which I saw in different places.

When I brought them together, then you can see all that architecture, landscape study in my paintings. In this, every thing, every area is a whole landscape, a complete architecture and original calligraphy I have done within it.

You can see this is a painting of Kashmir when I went before five months ago. Yes, five month ago I went to Kashmir, and their I see their living standard and their houses and their nature…

When I went in different areas of Kashmir, there is a place in which you see how I have shown the scenes of those areas in my paintings. When I went there, I saw a beautiful colorful sky and houses and an independent life, and as it is, I saw there all the people free from any tension and everything, People going to and coming from their work, I kept on seeing all this for a long time, and lost myself in that environment.

And then I picked up my pen and brush and my color palate and started working on this canvas. That was a house there in which there were children, women, and I kept on working there. And after completion I brought it here and gave the final touches to that over here, and afterward, because there was a particular feeling of what could be done there.

So I kept on working on the canvas there and then that natural scene, and feelings, living there, and life, I preserved all this on my canvas and I feel pleasure to see all those paintings all the time. Similarly, I go to different areas, different cities, and make paintings of those areas and bring them here for exhibition.

That is the true work of an artist, that he should not sit in his drawing room and not depend on photography, and he should be inspired from natural beauty and natural places and do their work on these lines. Because if it’s just to draw a sketch of a landscape with photography, in this way the feelings of the artists do not appear. These feelings appear when one works outdoors going to a place and showing his feelings. And then, colors will inspire the people and then all the colors can be seen in that painting that have come through feelings, by working outdoors.

I like this painting of mine, because this painting I made a long time ago. This is a place of Baluchistan in Pakistan. Now in the area, many houses have been constructed. But I am happy that I have saved all this on my canvas.

This is Khuzdar of Balochistan This is the final touches of painting.

The deep affection for nature, as well as the Pakistani people’s harmonious life with nature, is apparent in Mr. Hanif Khan’s paintings. We asked if he had message about nature to share with us.

I just want to leave a message that each and every human should work within his limits and do whatever he can for the betterment of himself and people around him. Because like a river droplet ripples, similarly, every human makes himself green first, and then the environment around him gets better and better. Then all the world will become a beautiful Heaven and better. The whole system.

I hope that the world is a beautiful place, and there are so many beautiful places and beautiful people. And beautiful things exist for humankind to live in this world, so that when the humans will see that beauty, then they will forget all their problems. In the world there are different types of people, and such beautiful things are existing; one should feel that and try to save all these things.

The people whose cars blow smoke, they should get them repaired themselves to create an environment friendly atmosphere for their health as well as for their next generations and the people around them. This is my earnest request to all human beings, that every person should think about oneself instead of criticizing the other.

These are the mountains of the Neelam Valley. When I entered Kashmir, I could see those mountains from far away and their beauty was so intense that I couldn’t resist sketching them right away, and I started working on it. And along with it I could see the orange and yellow leaves, leaves of trees falling inthe streams, and in the same way, there was a beautiful valley which I made a sketch of.

Although I had to move farther toward Neelam Valley, I started my work on my way already. And I spent a considerable amount of time there sketching it, and when it was complete, I moved a bit farther. Now I can do some work still to be done on this sketch, which I will complete gradually.

When I went a bit further, I saw another beautiful view in which people were taking water from the streams to their homes. People were enjoying the weather as the weather was very pleasant. Clouds were so low that one could touch them. I sketched this view and tried to catch it. Clouds, sky, earth, this is a beautiful picture of nature which belongs to Kashmir.

Once, I was coming from Panjnat, a River in Pakistan, to Multan, a city of Pakistan. On my way there were quite a few small villages and small towns where people were working. I liked that view very much and started drawing it on my canvas. It was evening time and the weather was awesome. I tried to catch that view on my canvas. On this journey in which I painted the other painting, I also got to see another view. It was daytime and we reached another place that day.

The journey was too long and tiring. I had seen too many cities and people. It was raining there. And I started to sketch that view, too. It was a village. People were going to their work early in the morning. I liked it very much. When you feel it, you can feel the touch of life in these paintings, and the shadows of these people, and the pathways. Everything.

I have drawn this specially for young people who lose their heart if they do not get a reward for their hard work. They are the one who change the fate of their countries. In this painting, I have described Allama Iqbal’s poetry, which says that I only love such people who aim high at the sky.

Indeed, it was Allama Iqbal, the outstanding poet- philosopher cherished by so many Pakistani people to this day, who advised to the youth, whom he loved: “I have love for those youngsters who pull towards them the stars.”

Hanif Khan’s artwork has always reached for the stars and new horizons. All the while, he has been able to preserve forever the beauty and feelings evoked by the idyllic daily life scenes from his homeland. People are constantly visiting Mr. Khan’s art gallery, immersing themselves in the peaceful vibrant invitations that beckon from the gallery walls.

We thank Mr. Khan for sharing with us your time and glorious work, wishing you evermore success and inspiration. Such loving expressions of art will surely continue to uplift all who discover them. May Allah bless you and the gentle people of Pakistan.

Kind viewers, thank you for joining us today on Enlightening Entertainment. Now, Words of Wisdom is up next, after Noteworthy News, on Supreme Master Television. May blessings that lighten the heart come your way.

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