Our collective canvas! @sharplasers

Dear Diary,

We’re Ansha Ali; two sisters, aged 20 and 22. For now, we go by our collective name, but it’s usually me (the 20-year-old) running this page. We’re from the city of Bahawalur in Pakistan.

What sparked our love for our crafts? Well, funny enough, it actually is the spark itself. For us, it was always there. We just couldn’t ever go without creating something anything; from drawing with chalks to play-pretending. We always had a very deep and beloved spot for art and craft. As someone living in Pakistan, we aren’t really told to pursue it or even do it. Growing up, I found so many of my friends reluctant when it came to painting a wall because they were afraid their parents would get mad at their dirty clothes. Plus, with the never-ending pressure to get A grades in every subject, we needed something that allowed us to be ourselves — and that’s what craft has been to us. Since the start, you could call it finger painting, we’ve had a deep love for it, and that’s what I think anyone can call a spark to create more.

Some recent works. Credit: Ansha Ali (Instagram @sharplasers)

Many, many things inspire us: people, cultures, any new art technique we stumble upon, or simply picturing something in our minds and just wanting to create it. It’s true that, growing up, we lost much of our inspiration, but now that one of us is able to pursue this as a degree specifically in textiles and fashion design, the stream of inspiration feels endless these days. Although the sadness of not having the art supplies or skills to execute something can lower our morale, our inspiration is never truly lost. We’re also very, very imaginative. So yes, endless creativity and inspiration.

For my sister, her favorite piece would be the first time she tried hyper-realistic painting of a hand in acrylics for her assignment (in which she nailed it pretty well), even though it still sits unfinished from that very first try. For me, it would be the clay ring I made completely from scratch (yes, even the clay) and turned into the prettiest purple color (which, sadly, got stolen :⁠,⁠-⁠). But if you asked the both of us, we’d say our favorite is every single piece we’ve ever made together. Sitting side by side, talking absolute gibberish and stupid stuff; those moments matter most to us. Like that one time we both felt extremely dizzy and couldn’t stop laughing because we’d been awake for more than 30 hours… and then started crying. Yup, that canvas turned out soooo pretty.

Art piece from our thesis. Credit: Ansha Ali (Instagram @sharplasers)

My most personal favourite material to work with is ink pens; using pens, markers, and all that. For my other half (my sister), it would be yarn. She lovessss to crochet. But honestly, we love any new material that can give us that zap of energy.

A weird or unexpected place to find inspiration? Hmm… I honestly can’t recall many situations like that. But maybe this one counts. We were supposed to finalise her thesis topic after she had only done half her degree (frr, don’t ask me why). We were watching a drama about a minority culture in our country, and at that time I had this weird liking for art periods or forms that weren’t well-known. I came across Danse Macabre, and somehow combined the two — drum roll — “Marwaris and Danse Macabre.” Only the “Marwari” part (the cultural minority) was finalised, so I didn’t even rename it. But it was definitely unexpected. The speed with which we thought of all the possible artworks, how they were connected, and how we’d represent them was actually pretty good… and a bit weird for me.

Until next time!

Ansha Ali