Frescoes in the Time of Smog
By Syeda Aiman Zehra and Hammad Bilal“Aik nukta, everything starts from it and ends at it,” says curator Madam Noor Jehan Bilgraumi as we embark on a journey she started in LUMS. The nukta she speaks of is the same nukta that we see at the center of many of the art pieces she has installed around campus—from the VC’s house to his office to the faculty lounge to the walls and domes of the HSS building. It is the same nukta that she sees in the heart of the university—the Academic Block—where the campus community finds itself at least once a day, passing by, taking shortcuts, rushing to classes.Two years ago, Madam Bilgraumi paid a visit to LUMS to see the building her dear friend, Habib Fida Ali had designed. What she saw was a bare courtyard at the center: “No one wanted to cross it, the c...