Ajaz Anwar

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Ajaz Anwar
British India
Nationality	Pakistani
Known for	Painting
Website	ajazart.com

Ajaz Anwar (

.

Life

Born in

to date.

Old buildings

The old buildings of Lahore are the main theme of his paintings. He has tried to preserve those buildings in his paintings which are replaced by new style buildings or they are crumbling. These are the buildings of old Lahore; not all are historical, but common homes of common people are the centre of his attention. Natural lively colours bring the buildings to life.

People in his paintings

Although buildings are the main theme of his paintings and people are just there to make a normal life but the characters he used in his paintings are the quintessential of daily life in

. The characters are faceless, but they represent the common people found in the bazaars: A Tonga rider, women walking in the bazaar, children playing, milkman, old people talking, and sellers of all kinds.

Kites

Kites are almost always present in his paintings. His main themes are common homes or buildings and on the roof of every building there is a kite lover and on the sky above there are lot of kites colouring the sky.

Life in detail

With close observation we find a detailed life in his paintings. A woman is peeping from the window or behind the curtain, a cock is searching for food bits in the garbage.

Comments on his work

"In my paintings, I highlight the parts of Lahore that must be preserved. I remove skyscrapers and instead incorporate tongas and sweetmeat shops," he said in an interview. The main focus of his paintings are not human figures. "The human figures are only used to bring these crumbling buildings to life. People are not important aspects of my art because they are born and reborn whereas these buildings, once destroyed, will be lost forever."

Ajaz Anwar was the recipient of the President's "Pride of Performance in Painting" in 1997.

Exhibitions

Lahore, Ankara, Rawalpindi, Istanbul, Rome, Kampala, Chandigarh, Delhi and London.

Ajaz Anwar leads Lahore Conservation Society and doing his utmost to preserve the Lahore as it was and preserving Lahore's heritage has become a personal crusade. "This is not in good taste and it does not resemble the original shape of these shops at all," said Ajaz Anwar to BBC.

References

• Aijaz Anwar documents cultural legacy of Lahore, Daily Times (Pakistan)
• Theft of Ajaz Anwar's Painting