At first glance Asma Arshad Mahmood's abstract female figure studies dont seem particularly subversive, but context is everything with these deceptively soft oils. Its not only the quiet sense of menace that lies below the surface of these paintings its the fact that they exist at all. Social mores in Pakistan make paintings by Asma Arshad Mahmood rather rare. She is getting major recognition as much for her bravery as for her technical merit.

DEIRDRE HANNAH, NOW MAGAZINE, TORONTO

Asma Arshad Mahmood created a storm with her bold and beautiful paintings, ".....and she is my woman" in Toronto. ....she is an eastern woman who is truly universal as well. So are her women in her paintings. Her use of light and shade enhances the beauty and sensibility of her subjects.

CANADIAN ASIAN NEWS, TORONTO

Asma has mixed realism and abstraction. Her use of colors borrows heavily from nature and earthy browns, vibrant oranges and ocean depth blues seem to be the most prominent. Transcending from the experimental level the hues are delicately balanced between the sensuality of life and shredded veils of darkness.

DAILY DAWN INT'L

Asma Arshad Mahmood, artist, writer, wife, mother, provides an inspiring model for modern womanhood. The images, most often the faces and figures of women, are subtle and mysterious, as if seen through a gossamer veil.

KATHELINE AMBROGI, EDITOR PUNJABBER
A PUBLICATION OF AMERICAN WOMENS CLUB

Asma Arshad Mahmood who ranks amongst the few liberal contemporary artists in a repressive and censorious society, fascinated the art buffs of the capital with her bold figurative, still life and landscape paintings. The figurative nudes are calm and reasoned yet compassionate portrayals of an ordinary woman in the society. They are passionate outpourings in response to the regressive nature of the society.

M. ARSHAD SHARIF FOR PULSE, PAKISTAN

Asma paints. She paints with brush and words. She wants women to be at peace with themselves and stop bothering about what others want them to do. But she is no feminist. She is not even a revolutionary. She simply lives a healthy natural life. One (of her) painting showed women soaking in rain but it conveyed no erotic feelings. Asma said they look happy with themselves.

ANWAR IQBAL FOR THE THE NEWS PAKISTAN

With swift strokes and pleasing colors she achieves a harmony both in form and composition, which distinguishes her as one of our modern painters. Asma, perhaps more than any of her fellow artists has access to the women subconscious. Her brush strokes skin deep, shaping dreams, easing the pain of lonliness, banishing encantations and omens, keeping alive the meomories of race.....and imparting respect for the fragility of life.

BEHRAM TARIQ INTERVIEWS ASMA FOR THE MUSLIM, ISLAMABAD

She does her compositions in layers. Her technique is to trap light, making the objects she paints transparent. Her colors are vibrant and pleasing to the eyes.

MOHAMMAD YASIN FOR THE MUSLIM, ISLAMABAD

The artist, though young, makes a genuine attempt to express diversified feelings by exposing different dimensions of the human figure, this being the most predominent theme of Asma's paintings. Often hidden in abstract, the human figure is present in most of her paintings.

ASSOCIATED PRESS OF PAKISTAN (RELEASE)

The colors and lines dissolve beautifully. The strokes are mature and solid and despite a hazy view one gets in first look, the strong lines immediately catch the attention.... It was the third exhibition of Asma in 1996 that opened at the German embassy auditorium today.

MOBARIK VIRK FOR THE MUSLIM, ISLAMABAD

.......Avoiding the extremes of most Pakistani artists who either become realists or go into total abstractions, Asma has mixed the two and given experimentation a new name.

FATIMA YAMIN FOR PULSE PAKISTAN

For several years now dozens of young artists have been appearing on the gallery circuit in Pakistan. Asma Arshad has struck out bravely on her own. A courageous attempt at establishing a personal way of working. One sees a number of influences and stimuli at work in these canvases.

SALEEMA HASHMI PRINCIPAL NATIONAL COLLEGE OF ARTS, LAHORE

After viewing endless paintings of teeming bazaars, flat Punjabi landscapes and of course, the ever popular if predictable choice of our realists - long gone Mughal splendour, it is refreshing to see Asma's work.

RINA KHAN, LAHORE