Khadija-tul-Kubra is an emerging artist born in Karachi, Pakistan in 1997. She was raised and brought up in Lahore and recently graduated from the National College of Arts, Lahore, majoring in Fine arts. Her preferred medium is oil painting and she likes to create visuals that include cultural references and candid moments that we often tend to experience but don’t give them enough significance. Khadija is keen on exploring her self-identity using family and her own heritage as a source.
“Our observations are uniquely distinct from one another. We’re set apart just by the way we observe and in understanding these differences, we become more capable of understanding our personal identity.
During the process of exploring my personal identity, I realized how for me, my family has had a great impact on who I am today so for my current works, I dug up an archive of family photographs starting from 1940s and studied my cultural references, interests and opinions while keeping the essence of the photographs intact.
I did so by using specific focal points in my paintings and using paint as my main language to create moods according to each painting. My use of strokes and colour palettes were intentionally my main sources used to differentiate from mere photographs to how I personally view them and to share the message to my viewers.
In my work, I tend to reflect my opinions regarding how I feel about various normalized scenarios, exploring intimacy, culture, and heritage while providing the utmost importance to our own individual perspectives.”Khadija