Creative arts emerge from shadows of Taliban

KABUL, Afghanistan -- His favorite pieces are the ones he painted of his family -- his grandmother's well-worn face, his father's worried eyes, his mother's gentle smile.

But those portraits remained hidden in his home for years, where Sayed Ahmed Zabir worked in secret because the fundamentalist Taliban rulers believed human images were unholy.

"When I saw the difficulties of my people, I wanted to show the world what was happening through my paintings. I wanted to show my work publicly but I could not," said the 25-year-old newly hired art teacher. "Now I can do what I want."

In the six months since the ruling Taliban were ousted from power, the creative arts scene in Afghanistan has emerged with all the pent-up energy of its long-frustrated artists.

Music, painting and films are seeing a slow rebirth as a nation starved of its culture, and art begins the slow process of reclaiming its creative birthright.

"Artists are free now. People are looking for a way to express themselves, their ideas, their feelings. Under the Taliban, we did not have that right," said Mohammed Hashem, 38, who heads the Ghlam Mohammed Miuminagi Art Center, Kabul's main government-funded non-university art school.

The free art classes offered by Hashem's center since January have been deluged by budding artists. Enrollment has exploded to 270 pupils -- most joining in the last two months alone -- and he expects many more. Zabir is one of the 18 teachers hired to meet the demand.

The sounds of music, once illegal, now fill the streets, blaring from radios and boom boxes -- the traditional rhythms of Dari and Pashtun music mixed with the high-pitched exuberance of Indian film music. Pirated films from Pakistan, Iran and India sold on sidewalks draw huge crowds of people at all hours of the day.

During their reign, the Taliban banned music, television, movies and theater. Photography, painting, sculpture -- anything that depicted images of humans or animals -- was prohibited by the Taliban, whose stern interpretation of the Quran viewed them as idolatrous.

Destructive rampage

In the final year of their rule, the Taliban went on a destructive cultural rampage, ransacking antiquities salvaged from the historic Kabul Museum that had been hidden in the Culture Ministry's storeroom and tearing up paintings from the National Gallery.

More than 2,000 pieces -- from turn-of-the-century portraits of Afghan royalty to sandstone carvings of ancient kings -- were smashed into piles of rubble or torn into a collage of canvas.

The two-month cultural assault began in February 2001 as crews of Taliban workers, armed with hammers and axes, were sent to destroy much of the nation's cultural heirlooms.

Even more pieces might have been lost had it not been for Hashem, a curator at the time for the National Gallery, and his two colleagues.

By the time the Taliban came looking to destroy what it saw as unholy art, the gallery had already lost about 200 of its 800 pieces to ransacking and looting during its civil wars in the early 1990s.

But the Taliban were more methodic in their mission: tearing up, burning or taking away more than 400 pieces.

Mission to save artwork

Furious at the wanton destruction, Hashem came up with the idea to disguise the remaining works, painting over the oil pieces with watercolor images of nature -- mountains, lakes and trees that did not offend the Taliban's sensitivities.

"We knew if they caught us, they would put us in jail or punish us. But it was my responsibility. I had a small opportunity and I used it. I was not afraid.

"Whether they caught us or not, I had to do this," Hashem said.

Working for weeks on end, the three men's daring rescue mission saved some 80 pieces from sure destruction.

"You must understand, a painting is like a child to an artist. It is like a son, so he must care for it like a son, Hashem said. "Some of these paintings are more than 100 years old. If they were lost, there would be nothing left of those who had died."

After the Taliban left, the gallery staff removed the watercolors carefully, revealing the undamaged oil paintings underneath.

Still, there is value in remembering the destruction left behind by the Taliban, said National Gallery director Sabera Rahmani.

One large room of the gallery has been reserved for the piled up mounds of broken frames and torn up canvases -- most of them shredded portraits -- standing in mute testimony.

"We have decided to place this under glass and show people what the Taliban did -- how they destroyed the pride of the country," she said.

The treasures of the past must not be forgotten, but the focus for Afghanistan's creative arts lies with its younger generation, Hashem said.

The government's Ministry of Information and Culture supports that goal, providing all the funding for the school's 18 teachers, as well as its art materials -- including paint, brushes, canvas, and paper.

"I took those risks for the future generation," Hashem said, referring to his decision to save the paintings. From his second-story office, he can look down onto the sunlit courtyard compound of his art center.

On a recent morning, a handful of young artists carefully wielded chalk pencils, their heads bent intently over their work.

Teacher Mahmed Emal Miakhil talked animatedly about the basics of line, shadow, and perspective as his five students sketched a subject once forbidden by the ruling Taliban -- his face.

In the small light-filled room next door, Zabir was teaching another set of students the basics of brush strokes.

Watching the classes in action, Hashem smiled with satisfaction: "We have a free hand to teach what we know."