Monirul Islam

Monirul Islam (born 1943) is one of the most internationally acclaimed Bangladeshi artists alive — a printmaker and painter based in Madrid whose lyrical etchings are held in major collections across Europe, Asia, and the Americas.

Born in Comilla, he studied at the Government Institute of Fine Arts in Dhaka before moving to Spain in the early 1970s on a scholarship. He settled in Madrid, studied at the Escuela de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, and has remained there ever since — though Bangladesh remains at the heart of his artistic imagination.

His etchings are celebrated for their extraordinary delicacy — hair-thin lines, subtle tonal gradations, and a dreamlike quality that defies easy categorisation. They are at once abstract and deeply evocative, suggesting water, light, breath, memory. Spanish critics have called him a master of etching; Bangladeshi critics claim him as their finest printmaker.

He has exhibited extensively across Europe, North America, and Japan, and his work is held in the Bibliothèque nationale de France, the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the Bangladesh National Museum.

He received the Ekushey Padak in 1980 and Spain's prestigious Premio Nacional de Artes Gráficas.