Afghanistan

The fall of the Taliban in 2001 brought about a rebirth of Afghanistan’s contemporary art scene. As social mores became less restrictive, Afghans became freer to express their individualism and cultural identity through art. In the late 2000s, funding from international donors began to pour into the country to support cultural and artistic endeavors, resulting in the founding or revival of various art schools and the rejuvenation of public spaces for art including the National Museum of Afghanistan, the National Gallery of Afghanistan and the National Archives of Afghanistan in Kabul.

With this artistic revival also came a variety of private institutions and programs. The Centre for Contemporary Art Afghanistan (CCAA) is a small art center in Kabul dedicated to the promotion and development of the local art scene and artists through exhibitions, workshops, and educational programs. dOCUMENTA, a German art exhibition, featured a parallel exhibition in Kabul and Bamiyan. Most significantly, Kabul Art Project, based in Germany, was founded in 2013 to provide support and promotion for contemporary Afghan artists around the world.

 One of the benefits of a resurgence of interest in Afghan art has been the sheer diversity of artists and mediums for their self-expression. Shamsia Hassani, whose family origins are in Kandahar, gained renown as the first Afghan female graffiti artist, regularly teaching graffiti workshops to students in the Fine Art Department at Kabul University. Mohammed Akram, working from Herat, makes his own paints from materials he finds locally including dust, mud, stones, and bricks, mixing them with homemade glue to create scenes portraying everyday Afghan life. And Nabila Horakhsh, based in Kabul, is a painter, photographer, and freelance culture journalist whose abstract paintings feature prominently the color red, which she says represents the love she feels for the world.

 Afghans have also been inventive in their use of public space. Since the U.S. invasion in 2001, huge concrete blast walls have been erected throughout the country, walling off the compounds of foreign entities and the rich and powerful from the surrounding populace. Another Afghan art organization, ArtLords, began painting murals on these walls with messages of peace and symbols of hope. Where walls have stood for division, the murals were an attempt to make them stand for unity and accountability—a visual dichotomy of past and future, reflecting both what has been and what could be. Over time, more than 2,000 murals were painted with the help of volunteers and activists. Sadly, almost as soon as the Taliban regained control of Afghanistan in the fall of 2021—indeed, before they even formed a government—they began removing ArtLords’ murals throughout the country and threatening the lives and livelihoods of those who created them.

 Now, in an attempt to raise awareness and provide a symbol for Afghans everywhere that peace, though elusive, is not unattainable, ArtLords has begun partnering with local organizations to recreate, through light, the same murals the Taliban has destroyed. By mirroring international art with local execution, ArtLords echoes key human rights and social justice messages that span borders, cultures, and dialects and serve as reminders that just as art is unstoppable, so is the human spirit.