Episode notes
Asma Waheed tried to go to art school three times.
The first time, at fourteen, her father talked her out of it. He told her that if he sent her to art school, he would lose her, so she studied home economics instead and carried on like that for years. The second time, at West Virginia University, she was one semester in when she became pregnant with her first child and had to withdraw. The third time, a master's at Hood College, she made it three weeks before learning she was pregnant with her fourth. Five years went by.
This is a conversation about what she did with the waiting.
Asma is a multidisciplinary artist from Ellicott City, Maryland, working in clay, metal, fiber, wood and mirrors, with an MFA from the Mount Royal School of Art at MICA. She came to the United States from a small town outside Faisalabad, too nervous at first to answer the telephone in English. She learned the language in a year, raised four children, and found her way back to the studio one class at a time.
She came to clay in 2011, the year her mother died, through a workshop called Healing Through Clay. The first time she touched it, she describes a state of khushu: her brain quiet, nothing else in the room. She has worked with it ever since, and she calls it her fifth child.
Much of this episode is her reading her own faith through the material. Centering a ball of clay on the wheel, which took her a year to learn, as the foundation underneath everything built on top of it. Firing as the trial that either breaks you or makes you stronger. Compression as the squeeze that strengthens. Unfired clay, which can be rehydrated and reclaimed, against fired clay, which is changed forever. And clay as a record: it remembers how it was handled, down to the fingerprints of whoever shaped it.
She closes on the dua (prayer) she has made for years: Ya Allah, don't let me waste me.
Follow her work on Instagram: @asmawaheedart and website: https://asmawaheed.com/
CHAPTERS
00:00 Intro
00:42 A typical day, and a week that repeats
02:12 Growing up in Jaranwala
03:07 The aunts, the munji, and what got passed down
06:35 Wanting art school at fourteen
07:23 "If I send you to art school, I'll lose you"
08:45 Home economics in Lahore, and the hostel at fifteen
12:30 Marriage, and the flight to America
13:29 Learning English, and being afraid of the phone
14:51 Starting art at West Virginia University
15:26 One semester in, and switching to education
18:24 Morgantown21:02 Chopping onions
24:06 Inside the 9 to 3
29:27 Why clay
29:42 Losing her mother
31:35 A class called Healing Through Clay
33:16 "I am Allah's artwork"
36:04 Centering on the wheel
38:51 Firing, breaking, and reclaiming
42:46 The clay remembers
48:12 Petrichor
52:20 Niyyah, and why it has to be renewed
55:48 Hood College, a fourth child, and five years
58:34 The pandemic, and "you asked for pebbles"
1:02:22 "Don't let me waste me"
1:04:27 The three nests
1:05:50 Where to find her work
Man laysa lahu wird, laysa lahu wārid.