Naz Ikramullah Ashraf (née Naz Ikramullah) is a

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

artist and film producer of Pakistani-Bengali origin.

Background

Ikramullah was born in London,

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

to a Muslim family. Her father, Mohammed Ikramullah, later became the first Foreign Secretary of

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 243 million people, and has the world's second-lar ...

and her Bengali mother, Shaista Suhrawardy Ikramullah, was one of the first Muslim women to become a politician and diplomat in the

Indian Subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a list of the physiographic regions of the world, physiographical region in United Nations geoscheme for Asia#Southern Asia, Southern Asia. It is situated on the Indian Plate, projecting southwards into the Indian O ...

. Her mother, who later served as a Delegate to the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmoniz ...

and an Ambassador to

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria t ...

, was a member of the Suhrawardy family of

Calcutta Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , List of renamed places in India#West Bengal, the official name until 2001) is the Capital city, capital of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of West Bengal, on the eastern ba ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. She became a Mohajir by moving to

West Pakistan West Pakistan ( ur, , translit=Mag̱ẖribī Pākistān, ; bn, পশ্চিম পাকিস্তান, translit=Pôścim Pakistan) was one of the two Provincial exclaves created during the One Unit Scheme in 1955 in Pakistan. It was ...

, though many of her prominent relatives remained in

and others remained in what would become

Bangladesh Bangladesh (}, ), officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the eighth-most populous country in the world, with a population exceeding 165 million people in an area of . Bangladesh is among the mos ...

. Amongst her uncles she could count Mohammad Hidayatullah,

Vice President A vice president, also director in British English, is an officer in government or business who is below the president (chief executive officer) in rank. It can also refer to executive vice presidents, signifying that the vice president is on ...

and Chief Justice of India and

Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy ( bn, হোসেন শহীদ সোহ্‌রাওয়ার্দী; ur, ; 8 September 18925 December 1963) was a Bengali barrister and politician. He served as the Prime Minister of Pakistan from 1956 t ...

, Premier of

Bengal Bengal ( ; bn, বাংলা/বঙ্গ, translit=Bānglā/Bôngô, ) is a geopolitical, cultural and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal, predom ...

and

Prime Minister of Pakistan The prime minister of Pakistan ( ur, , romanized: Wazīr ē Aʿẓam , ) is the head of government of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Executive authority is vested in the prime minister and his chosen cabinet, despite the president of Pa ...

. Her siblings include a brother and two sisters: Inam Ikramullah,

Salma Sobhan Salma Sobhan (; 11 August 1937 – 30 December 2003) was a Bangladeshi lawyer, academic and human rights activist. She became the first woman barrister in Pakistan in 1959. A member of the law faculty of the University of Dhaka, she was a co-found ...

and

Princess Sarvath El Hassan Princess Sarvath al-Hassan (born Sarvath Ikramullah on 24 July 1947) is a Jordanian royal and the wife of Prince Hassan bin Talal of Jordan. She was born in Calcutta on 24 July 1947, to a prominent Muslim family of the Indian subcontinent. ...

Jordan Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...

. She settled in

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

in the 1970s and was married to the prominent

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
'' Sufi Saint

Ashraf Jahangir Semnani Sultan Makhdoom Ashraf Jahangir Semnani ( ur, ; (1285–1386) was an Iranian Sufi saint from Semnan, Iran. He was the founder of the Ashrafi Sufi order. He is India's third most influential Sufi Saint after Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti of Ajmer ...

and some of his stories include ''Fatherhood'' and ''Reborn''. Together, they have a daughter named Aamna.

Education

Ikramullah was trained as an artist at the

Byam Shaw School of Art The Byam Shaw School of Art, often known simply as Byam Shaw, was an independent art school in London, England, which specialised in fine art and offered foundation and degree level courses. It was founded in 1910 by John Liston Byam Shaw and ...

( BFA) and later specialized in

lithography Lithography () is a planographic method of printing originally based on the immiscibility of oil and water. The printing is from a stone (lithographic limestone) or a metal plate with a smooth surface. It was invented in 1796 by the German a ...

at the

Slade School of Fine Art The UCL Slade School of Fine Art (informally The Slade) is the art school of University College London (UCL) and is based in London, England. It has been ranked as the UK's top art and design educational institution. The school is organised as ...

in London.

Career

Ikramullah designed and wrote a filmstrip for the NFB film ''Making Faces'', which won the First Prize for

Art Education Visual arts education is the area of learning that is based upon the kind of art that one can see, visual arts The visual arts are art forms such as painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics, photography, video, filmmaking, de ...

in Oakland,

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

in 1989. She also completed a film regarding the cultural life of Muslim women of the Indian Subcontinent. She teaches painting and printmaking at the

Ottawa School of Art The Ottawa School of Art is a non-profit art school in downtown Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. The school offers a one-year certificate program, a three-year diploma program, art camps, and general interest courses, as well as providing exhibition s ...

. In a review of Ikramullah's 1994 solo exhibition, Nancy Baele of the ''Ottawa Citizen'' wrote that "Her paintings and prints...reflect her view that Canada fosters an interior life, Karachi an exterior one. She merges the two through collage, a layered look and the compositional constants of architectural arches and cloaked figures to create an emotional tone of dream-like reverie." In ''Art India'', Pakistani art critic Quddus Mirza describes Ikramullah as belonging to a wave of Pakistani diasporic artists. Her prints and collages are in the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library ...

, the

National Gallery The National Gallery is an art museum in Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The current Director ...

and the Cartwright Gallery in Bradford, among others. In 2014, Ikramullah published a book (with accompanying DVD) about interconnections between Hindu and Muslim cultures called ''Ganga Jamuni, Silver and Gold: A Forgotten Culture'' (Toronto: Bayeux Arts, Inc; Dhaka: Bengal Publications, 2013). One reviewer described how Ikramullah's "Westernised education but Ganga-Jamuni moorings helped her in appreciating music, fine arts and the traditional embroidery and designs on clothes."

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ikramullah, Naz Alumni of the Byam Shaw School of Art Alumni of the Slade School of Fine Art Artists from Karachi Artists from London Artists from Ottawa Canadian people of Pakistani descent Canadian people of Bengali descent Living people Suhrawardy family Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century Bengalis 20th-century Bengalis