RASHID RANA (B. 1968)

Rashid Rana is one of Pakistan's leading artistic voices whose works have been showcased internationally in numerous venues and most recently alongside Piet Mondrian, Agnes Martin, Robert Rauschenberg, Andy Warhol and Andrea Gursky in the GridMatrix exhibition held in 2006 at the Kemper Art Museum. It is the aesthetic concept of the grid exploring the language of minimalism and geometric abstraction which serves as the link connecting Rana's work to his mentor Zahoor ul Akhlaq as well as to the aforementioned artists.

The duality of the image along with the 'double take' it engenders is a key feature of Rana's digitized imagery. Two Dimensions, 2007, depicting a monolithic skyscraper is also a composite image made from 'pixels' of everyday street scenes from Pakistan. Playing with notions of Gestalt, Rana's images reveal multiple worldviews both formally and conceptually. A comment on geopolitics post 9/11, he visually melds two disparate cultures with irony and wit as he tackles the underlying issues of inequality and violence binding them.

In this age of uncertainty we have lost the privilege of having only one world view. Now every image, idea and truth (may it be ancient of modern) encompasses its opposite within itself. Thus we live in a state of duality. This internal conflict translates into my work, on a formal level, as well as having geographical, historical and political connotations. (Artist Statement, The 2006 Sovereign Asian Art Prize, unpaginated)