SHAKIR ALI (1916-75) 235 x 235cm, Oil on canvas

Woman with a birdcage 1968

Trained in Paris, London and Prague, Shakir Ali represents the internationalism of the first post-Partition generation. However much the large areas of pure colour owe to Europe or America, the subject is entirely Pakistani, the woman with the birdcage reviving a familiar symbol of the status of woman within Islamic society.