Contemporary Art in Pakistan: An Object History will undertake an object-based approach to contemporary art from or about Pakistan. The last three decades have witnessed the rise of a strong and diverse ensemble of contemporary art practices within the country and among its diasporas, but specific exemplary objects have seldom been examined in depth, either for their aesthetic value or for their importance as artifacts of dense material and social significance. Through close and rigorous examination of a small number of diverse art objects in aesthetic and social terms, this book will provide a deeper understanding of the significance of art practice in South Asia today, and will also suggest methodological approaches for analyzing contemporary art from other postcolonial societies in Asia and Africa.
Iftikhar Dadi is associate professor at Cornell University in the Department of History of Art, and was also chair of the Department of Art (2010-14). Publications include the book Modernism and the Art of Muslim South Asia (2010) and the edited monograph Anwar Jalal Shemza (2015). He serves on the editorial boards of Archives of Asian Art, Bio-Scope: South Asian Screen Studies, and previously on the editorial board of Art Journal. He is also on the advisory board of the Hong Kong-based research organization, Asia Art Archive. Curated exhibitions include Lines of Control (with Hammad Nasar) on partitions and borders (Herbert F. Johnson Museum at Cornell, 2012 and Nasher Museum at Duke, 2013). As an artist he collaborates with Elizabeth Dadi, they have shown widely internationally.