Safa Daud is a contemporary visual artist and educator based in Lahore, Pakistan. Born in 2002, she graduated from the National College of
Arts with major in Painting and currently serves as Teacher Assistant in Painting Department at NCA. Her practice is grounded in themes of
memory, materiality and the body, often exploring the tension between chaos and stillness through layered traces of memory in the exteriors
and interiors
of Lahore.

“My work is rooted in the experience of observing Lahore from the back seat of a bike. A position that has shaped how I see and remember
the city. Unable to ride one myself, this passive vantage point became a space of reflection, where boredom gave way to deep and attentive
observation. From there, I’ve watched the city unfold in fragments, stories playing out in the blur of traffic, sudden quiet corners, and light that
briefly settles on a wall. My paintings explore the relationship between speed, perception, and memory, focusing on how time and movement
distort what we notice. The chaos of Lahore’s streets and the stillness found within its interiors are not opposites in my work, they coexist.
I’m drawn to the rhythm of the city: the weaving of bikes, the flicker of a passing gesture and the still moments that live beneath all the noise.
Though my subjects shift and contradict, each painting is a trace of what just passed, what I’m trying to remember or what is often overlooked.
With oil on canvas as my medium it allows me the time to move through my image and going over it in layers. The medium itself feels close to
memory, fluid and never fully fixed. The white space in my paintings holds as much weight as the subject itself, allowing me to use paint as a
body rather than a filler.