In December 2004 Bangladesh National Museum, Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy and Bengal Foundation, together with the artist’s family, mounted a major retrospective presenting 574 works to mark the 90th birth anniversary of Shilpacharya Zainul Abedin. The show comprising of oils, watercolours and pen and ink drawings was put together using the Bangladesh National Museum’s collection, Mrs. Jahanara Abedin’s personal collection and the Abul Khair Collection. The exhibition ran concurrently at the National Art Gallery of the Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy, the Bangladesh National Museum gallery and Bengal Gallery of Fine Arts.

Zainul Abedin reverently called the Shilpacharya or the guru of art, is the architect of modern art movement in Bangladesh that began with the setting up of the Government Art Institute in 1948. He was the founding principal of the institute and headed it until his retirement in 1967. For his visionary qualities and artistic achievements, he has always been the undisputed leader of our artist community. Zainul Abedin was born in Kishoreganj in 1914. He got himself admitted in Calcutta Government Art School in 1933 and joined the faculty of the art school in 1938. The same year he did a series of watercolours on the river Brahmaputra that earned him the Governor’s Gold Medal in an All-India exhibition. When he moved to Dhaka after the Partition he felt the lack of an art school in this region. Soon, with the interests of the entire community in mind, he set about trying to make art education available to all, even though this hampered his own work. He was determined to remedy the lack of taste evident in our society by awakening the aesthetic sense of the people. Since he could not achieve this only through his own artistic activity, he directed his attention to the creation of institutions.

The large volume of art being produced in Bangladesh today gives us an indication of the extent to which his dream has been realized. His students and succeeding generations of artists set up art schools in various parts of the country– Chittagong, Rajshahi, Khulna, Bogra, Narayanganj. Zainul started an art school for children on the premises of the Dhaka Art Institute. The role of that modest venture in inspiring a trend cannot be denied; the keen and widespread interest in art noticeable among children today is evidence of that. In this way the seed that he planted in the field of art education has grown into a magnificent tree. Zainul was not only interested in the development of modern art but sought also to develop the country’s folk arts and crafts and unite them in a creative fusion with modern art. With this end in view he set up the Sonargaon Folk Arts and Crafts Foundation in 1975. The same year he founded the Zainul Sangrahashala in his home town Mymensingh. Zainul was awarded Honorary D Litt by the University of Delhi, India, in 1973, and was appointed National Professor in 1974. He received the Independence Day Award (posthumous) in 1977.

Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy conferred on him a special award in 1998, to mark the 50th anniversary of fine art in the country. Zainul Abedin died in May 1976.
A month-long festival marking the Shilpacharya’s 90th birth anniversary was organised jointly by Bangladesh National Museum, Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy and Bengal Foundation, in 2004. The highlight of the event was an art exhibition featuring 574 of Zainul Abedin’s works, of which 180 were from the Abul Khair Collection. The exhibition was spread over three venues, the Bangladesh National Museum Gallery (including Zainul Sangrahashala at Mymensingh), the National Art Gallery at Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy Gallery, and Bengal Gallery of Fine Arts. A seminar, children’s drawing competition, photography exhibition, crafts fair and folk music festival were included in the month long festival. Bengal Foundation produced a brief documentary on Zainul Abedin (directed by Fahmida Munni) and published a 164 page catalogue titled A Saga of Man and Nature: The Art of Zainul Abedin.

Date: 12.12.2004 – 07.01.2005
Venues: Bengal Gallery of Fine Arts, Bangaldesh National Musuem and Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy
Oragnisers: Bangladesh National Museum, Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy and Bengal Foundation