Today marks the 48th death anniversary of the legendary artist Zainul Abedin. Born on 29 December 1914 in Kishoreganj, Zainul Abedin had earned huge fame during the early 30s when he was still a student of Calcutta Govt Art College.

He became well known in 1944 through his series of paintings depicting some of the great famines in Bengal during its British colonial period.

He was an exceptionally talented artist with international repute. Like many of his contemporaries, his paintings on the Bengal famine of 1943 are probably his most characteristic work.

In Bangladesh, he is referred with honour as Shilpacharya (Great Teacher of the Arts) in Bangladesh for his artistic and visionary qualities. He was considered the founding father of Bangladeshi art.

In 1948 he, and with the help of few of his colleagues, founded an art institute in Dhaka. That time there were no art institute in Dhaka and he was the founding principal of that institute.

Zainul Abedin was involved in the Bangladesh liberation war movement. He was in the forefront of the cultural movement to re-establish the Bengali identity, marginalised by the Pakistan government.

In 1973, Zainul received an honorary D Litt from Delhi University. He was declared National Professor of Bangladesh in 1975. NASA honoured the iconic artist by naming a crater on the planet Mercury after the painter, called the “Abedin Crater” in 2009.

The iconic artist breathed his last on 28 May in 1976 at the age of 61.