Artist Statement
As a Pakistani Muslim woman, mother, and artist working in clay, I navigate the complex dance between visibility and privacy, tradition and transformation. Living here in US where being seen often equates to success, I’m constantly negotiating what I choose to reveal and what I keep sacred. This tension—between self-expression and protection—shapes both my life and my art.
In my practice, I draw on traditional forms of boundaries: the delicate perforations of jaali screens, the drape of a hijab, or the architectural intimacy of courtyards. These materials—fabric, wire, glaze, and clay—become tools to reestablish and renegotiate boundaries in an era where social media and modern life often push our most private spaces into public view. My work is a conversation between the light I let in and the shadows I choose to keep.
I often play with light and shadow using fabric, jewels, and high-temperature wire to create structures that invite while also obscuring. The viewer might catch a glimpse of something deeper—then be gently redirected by a glinting wire or a tangle of form. Glazes highlight chosen parts of the surface; black washes reveal hidden biomorphic or geometric patterns. Boundaries emerge through tessellated stamps, faded lines, and stretched traditional shapes—symbolizing the push and pull between old worlds and new identities.
My ceramic vessels—smooth, breathing, sacred—are acts of reaching. Each begins with a lump of clay and a silent song beneath the surface, a language passed down through generations, whispering through time. Through shaping and carving, the vessels become bridges: between past and present, memory and material, land and longing. Utilitarian in nature, they speak to the shared rituals of domestic life—the table, the cup, the meal—as spaces of connection and community.
A transformative part of my journey has been learning the ancient technique of lusterware in Tapalpa, Mexico, under two Iranian ceramic masters. There, I traced the legacy of this shimmering artform—how it moved from Iraq and Persia to South Asia, how it once adorned mosques, homes, and sacred spaces before colonization displaced it. Now, many of these luminous vessels and tiles sit behind glass in Western museums, stripped of context, their stories severed from the soil they came from.
In reclaiming this technique, I resist sanitized narratives of preservation that overlook the violence of looting and displacement. My lusterware is not just decorative—it is a quiet act of remembrance. Iron oxide, copper, and ash become storytellers: spirals of lovers, tessellating geometry, blooming petals, and arches that reach toward the divine. These forms hold both beauty and grief—echoes of stolen tongues, forgotten kingdoms, and the strength of those who remember.
Clay, for me, is not just a medium,it’s a form of resistance, a vessel for memory and fire. Through it, I claim space for softness, for nuance, for the many layers of identity that don’t always fit neatly into one box. My work is a continuous act of balancing: between seen and unseen, tradition and disruption, private grief and public expression. And always, it is an offering—a story that refuses to be silenced.
