All You Need is Love Was Not True

Written by Binder Tohani

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February in Belfast carries a particular stillness, a transitional hush between winter’s weight and the hesitant return of light. Within this atmosphere, Catalyst Arts presented its Member Group Show, All You Need Is Love Was Not True. The title suggested irony, yet the exhibition extended beyond romantic disillusionment, probing instead the fragile nature of agency within an increasingly technologized culture.

"What remains" artist Shahrukh Asad

Members' group exhibitions often operate as platforms for varied practices to orbit a shared concern. Here, the curatorial premise questioned the illusion of control in an era defined by systems, algorithms and digital mediation. The proposition implied that while contemporary life promises autonomy, the idea that one can play the game and game won’t play them, the structures beneath may quietly shape behaviour, perception and emotion.

Among the participants, Shahrukh Asad responded through abstraction rather than direct technological imagery. Her painting, What Remains, rejected literal references to screens or circuitry, turning instead toward surface, gesture and material process. In doing so, she shifted the discussion from representation to sensation, from depicting the world to revealing internal states that shape how it is experienced.

Asad’s practice is grounded in the belief that painting can function as an intuitive and emotional field rather than a descriptive medium. Her canvases unfold as sites of movement shaped by colour, rhythm and tactile intervention.

In What Remains, dense vertical formations suggest architectural silhouettes, yet they remain ambiguous forms that appear to emerge and recede simultaneously. Built through acrylic, spray paint and restrained passages of gold leaf, the surface feels sedimented, layered through repeated gestures of application and erasure.

The artist approaches painting as a conversation rather than a fixed construction. This is evident in the visible negotiations across the canvas, scraped sections, compressed pigment, and areas where earlier marks are allowed to persist beneath subsequent layers. The composition resists finality. Instead, it exists in a state of becoming, shaped by instinctive mark- making and moments of both control and release.

Chromatically, the work is dominated by blacks, muted greys and earthen browns, interrupted by subtle incursions of red.

These reds do not operate symbolically, rather, they register as internalised energies embedded within the structural mass.

Their compression evokes psychological depth, suggesting emotion contained within systems of order. The tension between clarity and ambiguity becomes central, mirroring the broader exhibition’s inquiry into autonomy and constraint.

Materiality plays a crucial role in articulating this tension. Thick impasto passages confront thinner, abraded areas, producing a tactile friction that stands in opposition to the seamless surfaces of digital interfaces. Where contemporary technology privileges smoothness and immediacy, Asad’s work insists on texture and resistance. The canvas records time gestures layered, reconsidered, and partially erased, revealing a process guided by introspection and embodied awareness.

The sparing use of gold leaf further complicates the surface. Rather than functioning as an ornament or spectacle, it flickers subtly from within darker tonal fields. Its luminosity is restrained, caught between concealment and exposure. In the context of a technologically saturated age where visibility often equates to value, this muted shimmer suggests endurance rather than display. It reads as residue: something precious that persists beneath accumulation.

Asad’s abstraction deliberately avoids figurative imagery, creating an open field for viewer engagement. The absence of recognisable forms allows perception to unfold slowly, encouraging personal association rather than fixed interpretation. The work demands a contemplative mode of looking, one that resists the speed and instant legibility of screen-based culture.

Within All You Need Is Love Was Not True, What Remains aligned closely with the curatorial framework. If the exhibition questioned the authenticity of technological and emotional assurances, Asad’s painting responded by asking what survives when such assurances dissolve. What remains, the work suggests, is not spectacle or certainty, but the persistent trace of the human hand and the layered memory embedded in material process.

In a moment marked by acceleration and mediation, Shahrukh Asad’s contribution reaffirmed abstraction as a space of quiet resistance. Through density, friction and introspective layering, What Remains proposed that agency may not lie in mastering systems, but in sustaining presence in leaving a mark that endures beyond the illusion of control.

‘What remains’ was on display at Catalyst Arts in Belfast from February 5-26, 2026. The writer is an artist and educator based in Belfast and could be contacted at Btohani@hotmail.com.

Visit Shahrukh Asad's website for more info!