Zarina [Hashmi]

Zarina (1937-2020) was born in Aligarh, in colonial India. The displacement, violence, and trauma of the Partition had a deep impact on her artistic practice. Trained in Mathematics, she learned woodblock printing in Bangkok and Tokyo, and intaglio in Paris. Married to a diplomat for a few years, her life was peripatetic, and movement and migration remained central to her practice. 

Through stark lines, use of maps, and her own biography, she explored language, especially Urdu, themes of belonging, identity,and politics. Zarina remains one of the Indian Subcontinent’s most celebrated artists.