Anwar Shemza

Anwar Jalal Shemza (Urdu: ) (14 July 1928 – 18 January 1985) was an artist and writer active in Pakistan and later the United Kingdom. Despite being better known as an artist, Shemza published several Urdu novels and books of poetry in the 1950s and wrote plays performed on Radio Pakistan.

Early life and career Shemza was born Anwar Jalal Butt into a Kashmiri family in Shimla, India, in 1928. His grandfather owned a carpet business in Lahore while his father Khaja Butt was a civil servant. He was educated in schools in Shimla, Ludhiana and Lahore. While he studied Persian, Arabic and philosophy at Punjab University in 1943, he switched to art the following year, enrolling at the Mayo School of Art and obtaining a diploma in 1947.

In England, Shemza started to incorporate Islamic themes into his work. His Meem series of the 1960s was based on the first letter of the prophet Muhammad's name. His Roots series started in the 1970s and showed imaginary plants and roots derived from Arabic script below, while his silkscreen The Page from 1984 showed Arabic letters in illegible patterns. His granddaughter, Aphra Shemza, is a multimedia artist. In 2020, she launched an Arts Council-funded project shemza.digital, featuring her grandfather's 1962 painting One to Nine and One to Seven.