Painting

Painting remains the beating heart of Pakistani art, from the bazaar truck art tradition to oil and acrylic works hanging in the country's leading galleries. PakistaniArt covers the painters reinterpreting landscape, portraiture, and abstraction for a new generation, carrying forward a centuries-old craft while pushing it into unexpected territory.

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A wide, eye-level shot captures British artist David Hockney standing to the right of his famous large-scale pop art painting, A Bigger Splash (1967), which is mounted on a plain white gallery wall. The painting itself takes up the majority of the left and center portions of the frame. It depicts a modernist, flat-roofed house with floor-to-ceiling glass windows under a bright, clear blue sky, flanked by two tall, thin palm trees. In the foreground, a yellow diving board extends from the bottom right into a swimming pool of turquoise water, where a massive, chaotic splash of white and light blue water erupts, indicating someone has just dived in. The entire painting is bordered by a wide, unpainted canvas margin. To the right, David Hockney stands in a three-quarter view, looking slightly past the camera to the left. He is an elderly man with glasses, wearing a dark navy blazer, a black and white houndstooth scarf draped around his neck, and a matching houndstooth flat cap. His hands are tucked into his pockets, and his expression is neutral and contemplative. The lighting is soft and even, typical of a gallery setting, casting subtle shadows behind him.

David Hockney's Death Reframes the Aching Stillness of "A Bigger Splash"

The artist's most recognizable work now resonates with new weight, its invisible diver and silent pool speaking to presence, absence, and the impossible task of freezing time

Awais ShaukatJUN 12, 2026

Latest in Painting

PaintingJUL 28, 2026

Jai Halai and Monday-Malachi Rosenfeld Convicted Over Picasso "Motherhood" Protest

Kamil Dad
On October 9, 2024, two activists from the protest group Youth Demand targeted Pablo Picasso's 1901 painting Motherhood (La Maternité) at the National Gallery in London by pasting a photograph of a distressed mother and child in Gaza over its protective glass screen. The demonstrators also poured red paint onto the surrounding gallery floor to symbolize bloodshed while calling for a UK arms embargo on Israel. While the painting itself remained entirely undamaged, the incident caused roughly £8,000 in clean-up costs for the venue. In July 2026, both individuals—Jai Halai and Monday-Malachi Rosenfeld—were convicted of criminal damage at Southwark Crown Court and are currently awaiting sentencing.
ArtJUL 22, 2026

Why the Internet Thinks Every Painting Is a Crime Scene and the Truth Is Stranger

Awais Shaukat
An ornate and visually striking duotone graphic is presented in a bold palette of bright orange and vibrant teal, arranged with a dynamic composition that features four classical artworks tilted at various angles across a flat teal background. The entire image is layered with a distinct halftone dot pattern, simulating a vintage screen-printed or comic-book matrix texture that unifies the classical subjects with a modern, pop-art aesthetic. In the upper-left quadrant, a horizontally oriented, rectangular ornate frame encloses a rendition of Claude Monet’s Water Lilies, capturing the dappled light and impressionistic textures of a pond surface. Positioned in the lower-left area is an iconic portrait of Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, framed in a heavily detailed border, her famous enigmatic smile and serene posture clearly identifiable despite the stylized monochromatic rendering. Moving to the lower right, a large rectangular frame showcases Vincent van Gogh’s Almond Blossoms, where the intricate, twisting branches and delicate floral buds extend across the space in a Japanese-woodblock-inspired composition. In the upper-right section, oriented completely upside down, is a framed portrait showcasing a closely cropped human face with prominent features, reminiscent of a surrealist figure or a classical portrait inverted for a disorienting, contemporary twist. Each of these four paintings—along with their highly decorative, Baroque-style frames containing scrolls, filigree, and corner moldings—is rendered in a single, saturated shade of orange, creating an intense, complementary color contrast against the smooth, solid teal field that fills the negative space. Image copyright to "Awais Shaukat for PakistaniArt".
InternationalJUL 18, 2026

Lawsuit Alleges Stolen Pierre Soulages Painting Was Sold Through Christie's Weis Collection Sale

Kamil Dad
A Pierre Soulages abstract painting titled Peinture 161 x 200 cm, 14 novembre 1958 sold for $4,955,000 at Christie's New York (usaartnews.com). The transaction took place during an evening auction featuring the collection of Patricia G. Ross Weis and Robert F. Weis, the founders of the Weis Markets grocery chain. The mid-century masterpiece stands as a prime illustration of the artist’s highly regarded raclage technique, a process where layers of pigment are systematically scraped away to uncover hidden depths of color underneath.However, the high-profile sale has recently become the center of intense legal conflict in the New York State Supreme Court. A lawsuit filed by beneficiaries of the Zeckendorf real estate family alleges that the painting was stolen from their family trust between 1977 and 1980. The plaintiffs argue that the artwork was subsequently traded without a valid title, pointing out that the piece had even been registered on the London-based Art Loss Register (usaartnews.com). They are now seeking to claim the full multi-million dollar financial proceeds from the auction.In response to the litigation, representatives from Christie's (artforum.com) stated that the house was fully aware of the title dispute and had resolved the matter internally prior to opening the bidding. The auction firm maintains that the official ownership title has legally transferred to the new buyer, and they consider any lingering financial disagreements over the five-million-dollar pool to be a private matter between the competing families.

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