Five on the First

October 2026
Sanié Bokhari

“My practice draws from the visual languages and material histories of South Asia, particularly Indo-Persian and Mughal miniature painting. Trained at the National College of Arts in Lahore, I’m interested in the precision, compressed space, and ornamental line of the miniature tradition, while using materials like charcoal and pastel to create a looser, drawing-based language.

Figures, animals, rugs, and hybrid forms move between art-historical references and lived experience, exploring memory and belonging across places.

More recently, raising my daughter away from the home and culture I grew up in has made me think about what gets passed on to the next generation, and what gets lost or transformed along the way, particularly language and culture. The rugs in my paintings often reflect this, appearing distorted, floating, or in motion, as if existing somewhere between places.”

CV