In 2012, a whale shark was caught off Karachi’s harbour. The bizarre and theatrical footage of it being hauled up by cranes readying it for auction by local fishermen is available on YouTube if you search for ‘whale shark Karachi’. As a child I was under the naive impression that whales were far too mythical and serenely beautiful to ever bother swimming towards my city’s murky grey coast. I briefly remember reeling from the nausea of finally seeing the dead fish on the news and I started to imagine the whale’s stench every time we drove near the beach in Clifton. This propelled me to start hallucinating about how our city would react if an actual mermaid - the most hyper fantasised creature of the underwater world - were to be found on our beaches? What would those series of accounts look like?

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Veera Rustomji (b. 1992) is an artist from Karachi, Pakistan. She holds a BFA from the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture (2015) and an MA in Fine Art from Chelsea College of Arts, UAL (2019). Alongside pursuing her visual art practice, she teaches within the Fine Art Department at the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture. From 2015 - 2018 she curated and managed residencies in Karachi with Vasl Artists’ Association as a Project Coordinator and during her time in London she worked with the Learning & Collections Department at the Royal Academy of Arts. She is a recipient of the UAL Postgraduate International Scholarship Award and is part of a Chelsea alumni collective named Portland. As an artist she has displayed internationally; some key highlights include Rossi & Rossi, London, The Arts Licks Weekend, Late at Tate Britain,  Aicon Gallery NYC and the 2017 Karachi Biennale.

www.veerarustomji.com