ink and acrylic on paper. 2019.
I drew this thing inspired by N M Rashid’s poem Shab-e-zawaf-e-Abu Lahab. The poem describes an ever-worsening cycle of humiliation that could be broken if one faced the original moment of debasement. Instead, the protagonist oscillates between fleeing society to escape reminders of his humiliation, and returning wondering if his moment of salvation has finally arrived, which is forever elusive because the humiliation has colonized the protagonist’s identity. The poem, I think, is about that debasement is a self-actualized social phenomenon: one’s fall from social graces is predicated on participation in society. Also, phantasmal anxieties — that one is way real.