BIO
Saba Khan's multimedia works traffic in the language of memorial, monument and public projects. From miniature dioramas of a bureaucrat's boring office, flashing LED of retro sci-fi machines seen at power stations to indigo textile banners honouring peasant revolts, I balance grandeur, artifice and satire in order to explore the cracks in the structures. Saba lives and works in London, UK. She founded Murree Museum Artist Residency (2014 – 2020) and a satirical artist collective Pak Khawateen Painting Club (2019) triggered from the commission of Lahore Biennale 02. Shows/residencies include: Casa Wabi (2025), Qatar Museums (2024), Swiss Institute (2024), Gangwon Triennial (2024), Unidee (2024), Delfina Foundation (2023), 421 Abu Dhabi (2023), Sharjah Biennial 15 (2023), Onassis AiR (2022), Jameel Art Centre (2022), Paul Mellon Centre (2021), Lahore Biennial (2020), “ONE” at COMO Lahore (2019), “Zinda-dil-a’an-e-Lahore–Billboard Project” (2020) an initiative of Lahore Biennale Foundation, Karachi Biennale (2018), New York Times (2018). Grants: 421 (2022), Foundation for the Arts Initiative (2018), Sharjah Art Foundation (2020), Graham Foundation (2020), British Council (2020, 2021, 2022). Her work is in the collections of Jameel Art Centre, Sharjah Art Foundation, Ford Foundation, South Asia Art Institute, Servais Collection and has been published in the New York Times, Stir World and Asia Art Pacific.
Artist Statement | I, too, am a part of this history | You Selfish Dreamer | Sagar Theatre on Queen's Road
The female body becomes territorialized during war, civic unrest, in the public space and in the work-space; territories traditionally marked as the male domain. While we women step outside, fric-tion/resistance between the genders prevails. Where women’s bodies are violated, damaged and en-croached. The works look at silenced stories, silenced harassment and silenced witnessing that are fearfully not exchanged, becoming coded messages to save face, a cry for help and also to uncover dusted problems. While in conversation and recording my grand-aunt’s Partition experiences, she disclosed harrowing tales that she had silenced herself from for 70 years, where the woman’s body also becomes collateral damage and source of pleasure during communal riots.
Artist Statement | Legacies of Crossings
The first brown bodies to be transported across the oceans to England was of Duleep Singh the king of Lahore who was forever exiled after the defeat from East India Company and Annexation of Punjab 1849. This led to alterations of the river systems of Punjab where the first Canal Colonies were laid out for agriculture production and complex engineering systems were used to divert water. Crossing of oceans, referred to as ‘kala pani’ or black waters, in ancient Indian myth was considered as an act of stripping oneself of their identity and a state of loss of homespace. It was the ultimate punishment imposed by the British Empire to keep dissenters in their place. In recent times when brown bodies opt to cross oceans to land into places of better opportunities, they are blocked and diverted by visa regimes and bureaucratic labyrinths that keep them out. Like the flows of rivers were controlled by gates, another kind of opaque gates of paperwork keep brown bodies out.
Artist Statement | Knowledge of the Ancients
The video footage was shot during covid period and documents the time when the Gujjar nomadic community migrates from their winter home, in the plains in Jhelum, to their summer encampment in the himalayan foothills in Murree. Their encampment is on private property and is built through a communal activity with designated jobs for each family member stretching over a number of days to complete. Their precarious and vulnerable lives are exposed to the environment, weather, poor health and also government regimes and borders. Thirty years ago they journeyed to a higher altitude but because of checkposts and rise in cost of living, they cut their journey short to Murree. The Roma community in Europe traces their roots back to the Gujjar nomads in South Asia and have retained words from Gojri language. Before borders were imposed, they were free to wander beyond private properties and nation states, crossing from Asia into Europe.
