Ismail Gulgee loved to paint so much so that he once said, “I find it difficult to speak about my paintings because the act of putting together words only explains and cannot make real the experience, which for me, is the only reality, the only value that gives meaning to my life. I live only when I paint.” And he continued his painting journey till the end of his life. The legendary artist Ismail Gulgee met a mysterious death at the age of 81 on December 19, 2007. The tragedy resulted in a deep loss to the art world. Born in Peshawar in 1926, Gulgee was an award-winning, globally famous Pakistani artist. He made his name in the 50s as a portrait painter. He began to paint abstract compositions in the American style called ‘Action Painting’ in the 60s. He had nothing to do with Islamic calligraphy but it so happened that in 1969 he was commissioned to design a round copper shield of six feet diameter to adorn the stall of Pakistan’s Export Promotion Bureau in Expo ‘70 at Tokyo. Along the rim were forty round designs showing in symbolic form the various exports of Pakistan and in the