Acrylic, rose pigment, and silver leaf on canvas
2025
121.9 x 152.4 cm.; 48 x 60 in.
This work challenges the romanticisation of generational poverty, using food as a visual device to highlight stark class divides in contemporary Pakistan.
— The Last Course —
We gathered to dine, but fed on old wounds instead;
the bread grew cold while silence was passed from hand to hand.
Every plate was full, yet every heart arrived starving,
learning that a family can share a table without sharing itself.
The loudest voices were never the wisest—
they mistook whining for truth, and volume for virtue.
Grievances aged like heirlooms, polished and displayed each evening,
until resentment became the only recipe everyone remembered.
I watched the candles burn lower than our pride,
thinking how strange it is that a feast can leave a soul unfed.
Some inherit fortunes, others inherit arguments;
some leave with leftovers, others leave carrying generations.
So I learned this: not every table is an altar,
and not every home is built from walls alone.
Sometimes the greatest hunger is for a conversation that never came,
and the bravest thing you can do… is rise before the bitterness asks you to stay.
Acrylic, rose pigment, and silver leaf on canvas
2025
121.9 x 152.4 cm.; 48 x 60 in.
This work challenges the romanticisation of generational poverty, using food as a visual device to highlight stark class divides in contemporary Pakistan.
— The Last Course —
We gathered to dine, but fed on old wounds instead;
the bread grew cold while silence was passed from hand to hand.
Every plate was full, yet every heart arrived starving,
learning that a family can share a table without sharing itself.
The loudest voices were never the wisest—
they mistook whining for truth, and volume for virtue.
Grievances aged like heirlooms, polished and displayed each evening,
until resentment became the only recipe everyone remembered.
I watched the candles burn lower than our pride,
thinking how strange it is that a feast can leave a soul unfed.
Some inherit fortunes, others inherit arguments;
some leave with leftovers, others leave carrying generations.
So I learned this: not every table is an altar,
and not every home is built from walls alone.
Sometimes the greatest hunger is for a conversation that never came,
and the bravest thing you can do… is rise before the bitterness asks you to stay.
