Basit Mushtaq’s sketching is an expression of emotions

SRINAGAR — God has created every living creature with a special aptitude for a particular field. Since every human being is quite disparate to another, some possess certain kind of peculiarity while some have knack of performing other kind of work. So every human being is unique having peerless ability.

Now let me introduce one of the proficient and deft artist and a friend of mine, namely Basit Mushtaq. This person hails from a famous village, called as Pinglena in Pulwama district.

He has an immense passion and devotion towards sketching. Since every sketch artist portrays his feelings and emotions in his sketching, so does this fine artist. You can easily visualise and interpret the stories concealed in his art. His art mostly depicts the present-day unjust situations. His art is the reflection of love, peace and hope.

Basit is presently pursuing B.Sc Nursing from South Campus Anantnag, University of Kashmir. He maintains a balance between his profession and passion. He holds sway over both the fields. He believes art is that particular field which makes his instinct feel contented. According to him, art brings peace to his mind and soul.

He first portrayed the famous Afghan Girl, known as Sharbat Bibi whose photographic portrait taken by photojournalist Steve McCurry appeared on the June 1985 cover of National Geographic. After getting impregnable felicitations, he made himself completely absorbed in it. He had sketched plenty of celebrity stars in order to make his art visible to the eyes of the world.

He portrays things without any purpose of procuring from them, rather he does this for his own satisfaction. He is fully determined towards his work. “I believe that anything done with pure dedication and hardwork will lead a man towards his achievements and takes him to the peaks of success,” he says.

Initially, he started taking assistance from YouTube videos and gradually after portraying bit by bit, he achieved complete mastery over this.

He believes that an artist needs to be patient and consistent. These two aspects pave the way to success and contentment. He believes that a person gets his results after encountering huge trails and challenges in life.

He says, “It is also imperative that a person need to be loyal with his work, no matter what that be. Besides all this, one should enjoy and love his work rather not make it a burden. Curiosity for any kind of work makes a man do onerous and most challenging things with greater ease.”

He deems that art taught him to accept challenges in life and enhanced his problem solving ability which made him face and handle real life problems in a very efficient manner. He has also made a YouTube channel namely “Basit Mushtaq Art” via which he uploads variety of videos related to sketching which are beneficial for the interested ones. He has started teaching from basics of sketching there.

Since we know that Kashmir lacks a proper platform which could provide such artists a particular identity and address their issues so that their talent should reach to majority of the population which will encourage them and boost their talent. These people, therefore, disclose their talents via social media.

Despite knowing that social media is a big platform, government too should give adequate attention towards such rare talents so that youth will perform more efforts to cherish their talents in order to pursue their career, even as an artist.

Apart from this, Kashmir suffers from Internet blockade frequently. Internet blockade is frequent in both the length and frequency which therefore affects their work.

I personally feel that government needs to frame some programmes which will spread awareness among the people about such talented artists and encourage the youth to choose their career according to their ability. Moreover, people should also provide proper support and praise their talent so that they feel motivated and satisfied.