The Hot Spot’s Hand-Painted Pakistani Movie Posters Exhibition
at The Commonwealth Institute, London.
This Poster exhibition was a dream come true, but making it happen was quite the opposite. Transporting dozens of heavy canvas posters from Royal Park to The Commonwealth Insitute was easy in words, but the hassle and red tape made it a stressful experience.
Then, an unimaginable twist of fate just as we had mounted all the posters, labelled everything neatly, displayed the movie postcards and nailed the last nail into place, a bombshell hit, literally.
My elder brother joined us at Kensington’s beautiful Commonwealth Institute with the news that “Something had happened”. There was disbelief and numbness as we huddled back and headed home. Suddenly, the comical images of Sultan Rahi flying through the air with gandaasa impaling a good and a knife thrust into an enemy’s gut with blood splattering all over didn’t seem quite as funny as it did minutes ago.
Suddenly, our EExhibitionbecame something loud, ludicrous and wonderful, seemed prophetic and terrifying. The context had changed. The world had changed.
There was much conjecture about the EExhibitiongoing ahead in light of events in New York City. Ultimately, the administration decided to go ahead with the EExhibitionbut to include a disclaimer upon entrance that would put the violence-laden imagery in its context.
The EExhibition’ssocial and political subtext took on disturbing meaning in light of 9/11, more frightening than funny.
Reading some of the comments left by people who had visited the eExhibitionreflected the pubic mood in London in the wake of 9/11. The images spoke for themselves. The world had indeed changed.
The Poster Exhibition wound to its conclusion, and it was heartening for us to have been able to project Pakistani cinema even if the entire exercise was given a chilling twist post 9/11.
I returned to share photographs of the Paintings done by Mohammad Ghous Artists team, with the former very much in charge. It was stunning to be told he had suffered a fatal heart attack and this Exhibition will always be remembered in his honour.
