Flight IV

Zarina Hashmi (known professionally as Zarina) is celebrated for her printmaking, bronze and paper sculptures, and work with handmade paper. Between 1964 and 1967, she lived in Paris and worked with the artists Stanley William Hayter and Krishna Reddy at the renowned print studio Atelier 17. During this pivotal period, she learned various intaglio techniques, including the viscosity method for color printing developed by Hayter and Krishna. Like Krishna, Zarina often combined abstract patterns with representational elements. However, while Krishna evoked the organic world, Zarina’s dark palette and subjects referred more to contemporary urban life as viewed through the lens of Existentialism and the brutal legacy of colonialism, as well as the influence of post-structuralism and New Wave cinema. The print's scratched surface, layered patterns and colors, and textural effects evoke both scarred and isolated figures as well as urban walls and the graffiti and layers of posters and announcements that covered them. They also recall the art brut developed by Jean Dubuffet in the wake of World War II and the engagement with the detritus of everyday life found in the work of Nouveau Réaliste artists Arman and the décollagistes Raymond Hains and Jacques de la Villeglé.