Zainul Abedin

Zainul Abedin (1914–1976), fondly called Shilpacharya (The Great Teacher of Art), was the founding father of modern Bangladeshi art. Born in Kishorganj, he studied at the Government School of Art in Calcutta before founding the Government Institute of Fine Arts in Dhaka in 1948, which later became the Faculty of Fine Arts at the University of Dhaka.

His most celebrated works are the Bengal Famine Sketches (1943), a series of harrowing drawings depicting the devastating Bengal famine that killed millions. Executed in charcoal and ink, these works stand among the most powerful social documents in the history of South Asian art — raw, urgent, and deeply human.

Beyond tragedy, Abedin celebrated the beauty of rural Bengal through vibrant depictions of rivers, boats, fishermen and everyday village life. His scroll paintings — Nakshi Kantha (1969) and Manpura (1970) — are among the longest narrative paintings in the world.

He received the Pride of Performance Award from Pakistan in 1958, the Sitara-e-Imtiaz in 1966, and became the first recipient of Bangladesh's highest civilian honour, the Independence Day Award, in 1976, just months before his death.