M.F. Hussain Biography and Works.

Popularly known as the ‘Picasso of India’, celebrated painter Maqbool Fida Hussain earned both fame and wrath for his paintings. M.F. Hussain, who died in June 2011, was an accomplished painter mostly famous for his paintings on Indian women.

At the age of 20, he moved to Mumbai determined to become an artist. He started his career in 1937 by painting cinema hoardings to earn his livelihood. Hussain’s painting, ‘Sunhera Sansaar’ in an annual exhibition of the Bombay Art Society in 1947 marked his entry as a known artist.

He became a popular artist through a series of his exhibitions since 1948. He organized his first solo exhibition in 1952 and then there was no looking back for him.

He attracted a lot of controversies for his nude paintings of Hindu gods and goddesses. He was arrested and charged with hurting sentiments of the people. Organizations like ‘Shiv Sena’ and ‘Vishwa Hindu Parishad’ opposed such paintings. Following his arrest, the court had ordered that an artist has freedom of expression but within the limit of not hurting the sentiments of people.

One of Hussain’s films, Meenaxi: A Tale of Three Cities was also pulled out of theatres after some Muslim organizations claimed that one of the songs in the film contained words directly taken from the Quran.

His first film, Through the Eyes of a Painter, made in 1967 received recognition at the Berlin Film Festival.

M.F. Hussain was conferred with respectable awards like the Padma Shri, Padma Bhushan and Padma Vibhushan.

Trivia

Born in Pandharpur of Madhya Pradesh on September 17, 1915, M.F. Hussain got married to Fazila in 1941 and had two daughters, Raisa and Aqueela and three sons, Mustafa, Shamshad and Owais. His single canvases have fetched up about 2 million dollars.