MENAL BANO

Resident January 2024

Menal Bano is a visual artist based in Pakistan. She graduated with a BFA in 2020. She is an urban flaneur with a love for exploring, singing and capturing emotions in visual forms. Her work responds to the daily state of affairs that shape our perceptions particularly focusing on how gender shapes our experiences of urban space. Through painting, she explores spaces in a conscious practice of experiencing the city in a way that is both personal and political, documenting and capturing the narratives and emotions of the spaces around her. She uses colour as a primary medium to capture the essence of the moment which communicates a complex range of feelings through marks and gestures.

"My experience here of exploring the new space has been incredibly interesting for my journey of creating art, as a Pakistani woman we rarely get the chance to explore our own urban environment. The act of walking around in the city and discovering new sights is an act of rebellion and involves jeopardising your safety, breaking societal norms and creating art while always being on alert is scary,

Here my first impression was to feel like I have come from a different dimension, like an alien that has just landed on earth. Navigating through basic everyday tasks felt complicated as things in my side of the world are done a completely different way. The freedom of walking around to find my way around on my own has been daunting at first but coming out at the other end of discomfort is always rewarding."