Forum Pakistan

Ali, Shakir (1916-75)
Artist. A leading figure in the modem art movement in Pakistan, Shakir Ali was born in Rampur. From 1938 to 1944, he attended an art school in Bombay, where he received a diploma in wall painting. He also studied in Britain and worked in France.

Shakir Ali was influenced by Cubism and other modem trends in painting. He taught in Czechoslovakia, where he was greatly affected by Julius Fucik's book Reportage with a Noose Round the Neck and by the poetry of the German poet Rilke. In 1952, Shakir Ali headed the National College of Arts in Lahore, a post that permitted him to powerfully influence two generations of young, aspiring artists. His work opened up the epoch of experiments and innovations in the country's painting.

His art asserted basic human values. The artist's style took shape by the rnid-1960s. He worked a great deal on colour, form and line. He also saw great potential in calligraphy and painted some of his most outstanding works, using it as a structural basis. Decorative elements in his work are frequently linked with calligraphic forms. He executed several monumental panels on various themes e.g., A Pastoral, a panel in the Nuclear Energy Centre in the form of illustrated pages of a manuscript.

Shakir Ali was awarded the Presidents Medal for the best work of art in 1962, and the Sitara-i-Imtiaz (Star of Distinction) in 1971. In 1975, a museum named after him was opened in Lahore; exhibitions of young Pakistani artists are staged there.
Some of Shakir Ali's works are A Still Life (1952), Calligraphy (1969), and A Nude (1970).
BIBLIOGRAPHY: 'Paintings from Pakistan', 1slamabad, 1988.