Anisuzzaman Anis discusses his vision in art

Renowned artist Anisuzzaman Anis is a professor at the Department of Printmaking at the Faculty of Fine Art, University of Dhaka. A graduate from DU, he studied construction and structural designs. For higher studies, he went to Rabindra Bharati University, India, and Tama Art University, Japan.

The artist has so far established his distinctive magnum opus in the realm of art through his imaginative techniques and thought-provoking themes, earning numerous prestigious awards and grants both at home and abroad. He was the recipient of the Grand Prize at the 13th Asian Art Biennale Bangladesh in 2008.

Anis has earned praise for his work on life-sized woodcut prints. "My prints depict urban architecture, construction of human habitation and a city's structural design, which are closely related to geometrical and structural elements. Architecture fascinates me," he says.

Through the years, the artist has tirelessly experimented with lines, forms, spaces, textures, tones and overall shapes and designs. Taking a keen interest in European woodcut style with a strong Eastern influence, he turned towards minimalism and has established it as a personal hallmark.  Anis symbolically projects social and political dilemmas through his works, often focusing on neglected subjects.

Anis has captured our morphing urban scenery and retold the story through his woodcut prints. Nostalgic and poetic in nature, his works focus on subjects with x-ray vision, right through the flesh, to reveal the stark, brutal, and sometimes beautiful reality of progress. He has also created numerous masterpieces, using carved wood to bring to light urban complexities of the present day.

He concentrated on woodcut printmaking when he was in Japan. "During that time, I learned how light and shade can give dramatic effects to prints. Woodcut prints are as much about technique as imagination," he adds.

His works also speak of varied vertical, horizontal and diagonal lines, which subsequently constitute the complex cityscapes. A perfectionist by nature, Anis' prints are brilliant, neat and devoid of ornamentation.

Besides printmaking, Anis is an avid painter. The diverse facets of nature, including the seasonal blooms and resting boats, are recurring themes of his watercolour paintings.