Zainul Abedin: A master of modern art

He drew a series of watercolours as a tribute to the river Brahmaputra and it subsequently earned him the Governor's Gold Medal in an all-India exhibition in 1938. This recognition brought him into the limelight, and gave him the confidence to forge a style of his own. Zainul's dissatisfaction with the Orientalist style and the limitations of European academic style led him towards realism. While developing his own style, he however stuck to his fascination with line; he made versatile use of it in his interpretation of the everyday life of the people.

In 1943, he drew a series of sketches on the man-made famine that had spread throughout Bengal, killing hundreds of thousands of people. Done in Chinese ink and brush on cheap packing paper, the Famine Sketches depict haunting images of helplessness of the victims at the cruelty and depravity of the agents of death. The sketches brought Zainul all-India fame. His watercolour piece The Rebel Crow marks the climax of that style which depicts his language of protest. During different moments of history such as 1969 and 1971 Zainul executed a few of his masterpieces in the same style.

After the 1947-partition, Zainul settled in Dhaka. A brief two-year training at Slade School of Art in London reflected a new style--a Bengali style--in Zainul's works where folk forms with their geometric, sometimes semi-abstract representations, the use of primary colours and a lack of perspective were prominent features. Two Women, Painna's Mother and Woman are some of the notable works of this period.

Zainul's idea of modernism was not confined to merely abstracted, non-representational styles, but to a deeper understanding of the term 'modernity' itself in which social progress and individual dynamism are two leading components. The 65-feet scroll painting in Chinese ink, watercolour and wax, Nabanna that Zainul drew in celebration of the 1969 Mass Uprising or the 30-feet scroll painting Manpura that commemorates the hundreds of thousands who died in the devastating cyclone of 1970 show his dynamic style at work.

In 1975, Zainul Abedin set up a folk museum at Sonargaon, and a gallery in Mymensingh to house some of his works. He became actively involved in a movement to preserve the heritage of Bengal, and reorient Bengal art to the roots of Bengali culture. The great leader and organiser of modern art died on 28 May 1976 in Dhaka.

Zainul Abedin's 90th birth anniversary was observed yesterday.

Compiled by Cultural Correspondent