A memorial meeting to pay tribute to late Ismail Gulgee will be held at the Fomma-DHA Art Centre, Karachi today at 4:30 pm, says a press release. Those who will attend the meeting as speakers include Marjorie Husain, Javed Jabbar and Zuffiqar Ali Lakhani, Chairman Fomma.
The late Gulgee, Pride of Performance, Sitara-e-Imtiaz (twice), Hilal-e-Imtiaz, was globally famous artist born in Peshawar. He was a qualified engineer and self-taught abstract painter and portrait painter. Before 1959, as portraitist, he painted the entire Afghan Royal Family. From about 1960 on, he was noted as an abstract painter influenced by the tradition of Islamic calligraphy and by the American "action painting" idiom, the release said.
From portrait painter, through abstract paintings, to a calligrapher, Gulgee travelled far and wide. But essentially the journey was more within his heart, untrammelled by dictates or choices of others. Even when he took commissioned works he was the final arbiter of the style.-PR