Gifted artist Ayesha Sultana received the Samdani Art Award 2014 at the award giving ceremony held at the Pan Pacific Sonargaon Hotel on Friday. Samdani Art Foundation, in collaboration with the UK-based Delfina Foundation, has introduced the award in the second edition of the Dhaka Art Summit 2014.
As the recipient of the award, the artist is to attend a three-month residency programme at the Delfina Foundation in the UK, where she will work and exhibit her work.
Earlier, portfolios of 75 artists were sent to the international jury board at Delfina, wherefrom they short-listed ten artists and ultimately declared Ayesha the winner.
The international jury for the award included noted personalities in art and culture like Aaron Cezar (Founding Director, The Delfina Foundation, UK), Eungie Joo (Director of Art and Cultural Programmes,
Instituto Inhotim, Brazil), Jessica Morgan (Curator, Tate Modern, UK), Sandhini Poddar (Adjunct curator, Solomon R Guggenheim Museum, New York) and Pooja Sood (Director, Khoj International Artists’ Association, India).
Ayesha, who earned her fine arts degrees from Lahore National University, is passionate about the varied genres of fine arts including painting, drawing, sculpture and sound installation. Dhaka Tribune caught up with the artist about her work:
Tell us about the concept and context of your artwork on display at the Dhaka Art Summit 2014.
My artwork is exhibited in two parts at the DAS: B/Desh and Samdani Art Award Exhibition. In B/Desh Art Exhibition, I have five drawings that are from different series of artworks. All the pieces are done on papers and on photograph. Other elements and dimensions of my works are exposing, cutting, slicing and crushing the papers.
The three pieces at the Samdani Art Award show are extensions of my ongoing art series. The first three pieces in of the series are done on velvet with threads. To portray my thoughts, I scripted some texts on the velvet. The texts are collected from the various journals which are about certain situation of my life and certain feelings.
What were the inspirations behind your artistic endeavours?
I acquire inspiration from every forms of art like literature, music, film, old buildings and others. My drawings are like architecture specimen, but it’s not architecture. Even Dhaka was an inspiration on my sound art.
Who is your role model?
I have admired by many great artists, but my role models of the artistic world are mostly dead.
One of them is Spanish painter Francisco Goya.
Tell us about your future plans
My first solo art exhibition is going to be showcased at the Bengal Art Lounge. I am working on it at the moment.