KUALA LUMPUR – Diagnosed as an autistic child at the age of two, little did Wan Jamila Wan Shaiful Bahri know that her art would take the world by storm.
Having had difficulty communicating with her mother, retired architect and lecturer Noorhashimah Noordin, Jamila, popularly known as Artjamila, was home-schooled due to lack of facilities for children with special needs at regular schools.
It was during that process that Noorhashimah devised her own curriculum for Jamila focusing on art, which earned Jamila fame via her detailed art sketching, size, and colour composition.
Twenty years on, Jamila is an internationally recognised artist who expresses her emotions through art and constantly puts nature and the environment as subjects in her paintings.
International accolades
In 2020, the Viatalenta Foundation in Switzerland appointed Jamila as its “Impact Artist” for sea pollution awareness.
For Jamila’s work in creating awareness on the impact of the coronavirus through her art, she was included in the World Generation Z article in 2020 by Agence France-Press in Paris for being “creative and committed against the virus”.
British Publishing House documented her success in Britishpedia’s article titled Successful People in Malaysia 2020, while in the same year she was chosen as Gen. T Honouree Asian Leaders of Tomorrow.
Her solo exhibition, Voyage of Moments, was officiated by Her Royal Highness Tengku Permaisuri Norashikin of Selangor and held at the Creative Media Technology Hub in UiTM.
The paintings detail Jamila’s journey from the time she started sketching as a child of four years up to the present.
“She started drawing at the age of four,” shared Noorhashimah, adding that her daughter is mostly non-verbal.
“But the moment she picked up a paintbrush, all that changed, and Jamila started communicating with me through her art.”
Noorhashimah felt at the time that her daughter had the potential of making art her career.
During Jamila’s early education at a private primary school, Noorhashimah wanted her to socialise and be a part of school activities, while the educational aspect was planned around home-schooling.
“I bought all the primary school books and materials and taught her at home. Over time, I educated myself on how to educate Jamila,” said the mother of two, whose younger daughter Jemima has been a bedrock in assisting Noorhashimah in her care for Jamila.
It was a turning point in their lives when Noorhashimah was diagnosed with colon cancer in 2016.
“I underwent two major operations, so Jamila was left on her own for eight months and it was too late to catch up with schoolwork.”
Home-schooling curriculum focusing on art
“When I made my recovery, I then decided to devise my own curriculum for her,” said Noorhashimah, adding that while Jamila was good at mathematics and science, she had difficulty stringing sentences together.
Associate Prof Mumtaz Mokhtar, head of fine arts studies at the College of Creative Art in UiTM Shah Alam, believes that Jamila’s art went through various phases from age four when she began her art sketching, with each art piece reflecting her journey.
Jamila found it difficult initially to make friends, but her art improved steadily the moment she engaged with people and made friends.
“When she started making new friends at a young age, Jamila lived a more enjoyable life. Those feelings were reflected in her drawings. Her figures drawn at the age of nine started to have three-dimensional qualities,” said Mumtaz.
Mumtaz believes at 11 years’ old, Jamila’s figure drawings became more stylised.
“The details of the attire, hairstyle, costumes, and various sizes of people indicated the characters of the figures.”
Painting, a way of healing
Noorhashimah shared how at the beginning of Jamila’s art journey, she had to learn everything about art from scratch and local well-known artists were consulted on ways to develop Jamila’s talent to the fullest.
Jamila herself feels that her art is an extension of how she feels on various topics, especially nature.
On the question of how art has helps her find solace and peace, Jamila said painting is a way of healing.
“Art to me is as therapeutic as music. It makes me happy. When I draw, my hands and brain are focused on a therapeutic activity,” said Jamila.
The artwork Jamila is most proud of is The Fish Mosaic in the Wave of the Polluted Sea, because it is her first painting to combine oil and plastic pollution and both sad and happy fish.
“I am proud I tried something new,” added Jamila.
Nature is important to Jamila because she feels without nature, there is no beauty in the world.
April 2 was declared by the United Nations General Assembly as World Autism Awareness Day to highlight the need to “help improve the quality of life of those with autism so they can lead full and meaningful lives as an integral part of society”. – The Vibes, April 9, 2022
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