The jury of the Ganesh Haloi Bengal (GHB) Research Grant has selected Ahmad Ibrahim to be its first recipient, says a press release by Bengal Arts Programme. The grant will cover Ahmad Ibrahim's project conducted over a period of 12 months and will lead to a public presentation in the form of a written essay. Bengal Arts Programme will further support Ahmad's research by setting up a platform of dialogue between the recipient and various resource persons. In addition to selecting Ahmad Ibrahim, the jury has, on the basis of the strength of their applications, nominated Fiona Cheng (Taiwan); Kehkasha Sabah (Bangladesh); Musharrat Sharmee Hossain (Bangladesh) and Salma Jamal (Bangladesh); and Sumona Banerjee (India) for Honourable Mention. 

Titled as “Concealing the Populace in Public Space -- Mapping Aesthetic Shifts in the Production of Political Posters in Dhaka”, Ahmad Ibrahim's project will trace the major aesthetic evolution in the production of political posters between the period of Bangladesh's Liberation War and the present day. The recipient aims to demonstrate that, whereas the poster imagery of artists such as Nitun Kundu or Quamrul Hassan once privileged the populace over the personal to support engaged struggles, this popular aesthetic has subsided in today's poster-making practice to single out individual figures. Mapping the different visual stages of this evolution, the recipient's project will also attempt to define its various meanings. “My research hopes to spark cross-disciplinary dialogue on the relationship between art practices and the spatio-temporal configurations of fractured urbanities,” Ahmad writes in his research proposal.

The Jury of the Ganesh Haloi Bengal Art Research Grant 2017 comprised of architect Marina Tabassum (Bangladesh), film-maker Naeem Mohaiemen (Bangladesh) and researcher Sabih Ahmed (India). 

The Ganesh Haloi Bengal Research Grant was set up by Bengal Arts Programme to encourage original research and critical writing projects furthering the understanding and appreciation of the arts of, from, or relating to the greater Bengal region. Appraised bi-annually by an independent jury, the grant is supported by artist Ganesh Haloi (b. 1936, Jamalpur, Bangladesh), and managed by Bengal Arts Programme.