Anchoring Fiza Khatri’s immersive display at Art Basel Hong Kong is a seven-panel painting called ‘Beloved’.
‘Beloved’ is an installation of paintings of garlands arranged to hide letter forms spelling the word ‘beloved’. While the word is illegible, its presence infuses the space depicted with a reverent anticipation of a meeting or a gathering. Across South Asia, garlands are used to mark ceremonial moments including celebration and mourning. Flowers adorn bodies, homes, gravesites, and shrines to consecrate significant moments and spaces. The term ‘beloved’ appears in Sufi poetics to refer to the object of one’s desire, God, and sometimes, as in the case of Sindhi Sufi saint Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai’s Risalo, even the self. Ultimately, all of these subject positions are interchangeable. Here, the space is adorned with this word-spell in preparation for a sacred moment of union between a lover and their beloved.’
Fiza Khatri
‘Beloved’
Acrylic and oil on canvas
7 panels
