On November 28, Doha welcomed the Lawh Wa Qalam: M.F. Husain Museum, the first institution dedicated solely to post-independence Indian modernist Maqbool Fida Husain. The museum houses over 150 works and personal objects, offering a sweeping view of the artist’s seven-decade career. Visitors trace Husain’s lifelong exploration of Indian culture and folklore—a pursuit often controversial—as he shaped 20th-century modernism with his distinctive Cubist-inspired visual language.
Born in 1915 in Pandharpur, Maharashtra, Husain showed an early passion for art. By 17, he was sleeping on Bombay pavements, searching for work, eventually landing jobs painting cinema banners—a foundation that honed his speed and large-scale composition skills. Over the decades, Husain expanded his practice across painting, drawing, film, tapestry, and installation, asking a single, enduring question: what is the visual language of India?
Later, political and legal pressures in India over nude depictions of Hindu deities forced Husain into self-imposed exile in 2006. He divided his time between London and Qatar, producing works reflecting India’s rich cultural legacy and its links to the Arab world. Husain passed away in 2011 in London, leaving behind a vast, globally recognized body of work. In 2025, his 1954 painting Untitled (Gram Yatra) fetched $13.75 million at Christie’s, setting a record for modern Indian art.
The Doha museum, built around a design inspired by Husain’s own sketches, brings together the arc of his life and work in the country where he became a citizen late in life. “He lived through world wars, independence movements, and profound political change,” said curator Noof Mohammed. “We hope visitors see how inseparable his life was from his art.”
Early Works: Childhood and National Identity
Untitled (Doll’s Wedding) (1950) was created as Husain joined the Progressive Artists’ Group, which sought a distinctly Indian modernism blending Western movements with local traditions. Inspired by the childhood ritual of staging mock doll weddings, the painting reflects Husain’s early work designing children’s toys, emphasizing playful, sensory experience. At a time when India was forging a postcolonial identity, this work mirrored the nation’s search for unity and authenticity.
Chronicling History: The Quit India Movement
By the 1980s, Husain’s work captured India’s political struggles. Quit India Movement (1985) revisits Gandhi’s 1942 call for mass civil disobedience, using faceless colonial figures in stark outlines and a seated ascetic signaling resistance. The sharp contours, flattened geometry, and compressed composition convey urgency and mark a turning point from nostalgic themes to active political commentary.
Symbolism and Cultural Reflection
In Elephant (1992), Husain’s recurring cut-out, two-dimensional style emphasizes cultural symbols—here, the elephant, emblematic of wisdom in Hinduism. Created amid renewed scrutiny from far-right groups over earlier works, it reflects his enduring search for an Indian visual language.
Husain also explored themes of motherhood in Mother Teresa (1998). Returning to the nun as a subject for over a decade, Husain reflected on his own lost mother, portraying her figure in abstraction—faceless, mournful, elongated, and enveloped in drapery. This emphasis on posture and form over identity carried into his later film work, including Gaja Gamini (2000), a tribute to womanhood starring Madhuri Dixit.
Towards Humanism
By the early 2000s, Husain’s identity as a Muslim artist became politically charged. Humanism (2003), part of the “Theorama” series, celebrates shared human values across religions. A reclining figure stretches across a canvas, surrounded by symbols, script, and handmade paper, emphasizing spiritual unity. Two paintings from the series were later shown at the UN, with British Prime Minister Tony Blair citing them in a peace pledge.
Exile and Global Horizons
Husain’s later works reflect his life in exile. Yemen (2008) captures the vibrancy of Arab culture, blending landscapes, markets, and minarets with the playfulness of his early childhood wonder. Similarly, Arab Astronomy (2008) intertwines Indian visual traditions with Islamic intellectual history, portraying the Persian astrologer Abu Maʿshar among stars and celestial forms in Husain’s signature flattened style.
Final Vision: Lawh Wa Qalam
Husain’s last major work, Seero fi al Ardh (2019), is a kinetic installation commissioned by Sheikha Moza bint Nasser for the Qatar Foundation. Completed posthumously from his sketches, it features life-sized Murano crystal horses, vintage automobiles, and a suspended bronze figure of Abbas ibn Firnas, the 9th-century father of aviation. The piece merges nature, machinery, and history, reflecting Husain’s lifelong fascination with movement, mythology, and progress. The title, Lawh Wa Qalam—“The Tablet and the Pen”—underscores the final assertion of his creative voice, even amid mortality.
Through this museum, visitors experience Husain’s journey from a young artist on Bombay pavements to a globally celebrated modernist, capturing India’s cultural depth while embracing a vision of unity beyond borders.
