Farrah Mahmood Rana is a distinguished artist, curator, and educator specializing in Mughal and South Asian miniature painting, based in Islamabad, Pakistan. She graduated from the National College of Arts (NCA), Lahore; holds a Master’s degree in Art Education from Beaconhouse National University (BNU); and is currently pursuing a PhD at Riphah International University.
She serves as a Professor in the Department of Art and Design at COMSATS University Islamabad (CUI). In 2011, she founded the Comsats Art Gallery (CAG), where she has played a pivotal curatorial role by organizing and leading numerous national and international exhibitions that have significantly advanced cross-cultural artistic dialogue. Through her academic, curatorial, and administrative leadership, she has strengthened contemporary art discourse in institutional spaces while promoting women’s empowerment and Pakistan’s arts and crafts.
Farrah’s artistic practice is grounded in Asian and Mughal miniature traditions, employing hand-prepared wasli paper and rigorous classical techniques. Her work critically engages with socio-political realities, addressing themes of power, injustice, peace, nature, humanity, climate change, and ethical responsibility. Through the lens of miniature art, her ongoing practice explores motherhood, tradition, identity, peace, and gendered labour, expanding contemporary discourse on heritage, kinship, and cultural memory. By fusing traditional miniature methodologies with contemporary narratives, she bridges historical visual languages and present-day concerns, articulating both personal and collective experience.
Alongside her studio practice, Farrah has delivered lectures and conducted workshops at leading art colleges, universities, and cultural institutions in Pakistan and abroad, including engagements in the United Kingdom, the United States, Austria, France, and China. Her contributions to art and education have been widely recognized: she was awarded the President’s Pride of Performance in 2024, received an Excellence Award from Beaconhouse National University in 2023, and was honoured with a Peace Award from the Peace Garden Museum in Beijing, China, in 2017. She is also a recipient of the Charles Wallace Visiting Fellowship (UK) for excellence in traditional miniature art and has participated in multiple international residencies and workshops.
Her work has received international acclaim, including selection as a winner in the World Bank’s “Imagining Our Future Together” a juried art competition. Her artworks are held in prominent permanent collections such as the World Bank, the National Art Gallery of Pakistan, the Parliament House of Pakistan, the Ministry of Science and Technology (Islamabad), the Austrian Embassy, the Charles Wallace Trust, the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China, and the U.S. Embassy in Pakistan.
Farrah has curated numerous national and international projects, notably “My Traditions Versus Your Modernity” for the Islamabad Art Festival (IAF-19) at CAG, reflecting her sustained commitment to fostering contemporary dialogue through traditional artistic forms. In addition to six solo exhibitions, she has participated in over 170 national and international group shows across the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Austria, France, Hong Kong, China, Azerbaijan (Baku), Iran (Tehran), Saudi Arabia (Jeddah), India, Bangladesh, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Greece, and Germany.
She maintains an active studio practice at FMR Art Space in Tumair, Islamabad, where she leads women’s empowerment initiatives, curates exhibitions, organises Art Talks, and conducts workshops in traditional miniature painting, alongside ongoing scholarly research and curatorial projects.
