05/02/2026 General, Modern & Contemporary Art
“I do not feel at home anywhere, but the idea of home follows me wherever I go.”
—Zarina Hashmi
Zarina Hashmi (1937–2020), who made works on paper her central artistic output, creates a distinctive visual language informed by an enduring sense of the fluidity of home. Born in Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh, India, she experienced displacement during the Partition of India in 1947 and later lived across several continents as the wife of an Indian diplomat. These experiences remained central to her practice, shaping the underlying themes in her work.
Her earliest memories of paper were of books in her family home—her father was a professor at Aligarh Muslim University—which helped shape her lifelong attachment to the material. She earned a degree in mathematics at Aligarh Muslim University and considered architecture, but even as she moved away from that path, a sensitivity to geometry, structure and spatial order continued throughout her artistic career.
In 1958, she married Saad Hashmi, an Indian diplomat, and her life became a series of international postings, reinforcing her sense of place as something continually redefined. During these years, she began developing her artistic practice. She was introduced to woodblock printmaking in Bangkok, studied intaglio at Atelier 17 in Paris under William Stanley Hayter, and later spent a year in Tokyo studying woodblock printing with Toshi Yoshida. These experiences deepened her engagement with paper and helped refine the pared-down visual language that would define her work.
She joined her husband in New York following his diplomatic posting to India’s mission at the United Nations, and after his death in 1977, she remained in the city, fully committing to her art. Working from her studio, she developed her signature approach using handmade paper, woodcuts and three-dimensional casts in paper pulp. Works such as Home, 1981, from the Estate of Susann Kelly Kurz, exemplify this sensibility—restrained in form yet dense with memory—transforming architectural forms into a minimalist language of displacement and belonging.
Auction Wednesday, May 20, 2026 at 11am
Exhibition May 16 – 18
Lot 84
Zarina Hashmi
Indian/American, 1937-2020
Home, 1981
Cast paper pulp
7 3/4 x 23 1/8 x 1 1/4 inches (19.7 x 58.7 x 3.2 cm)
Property from the Estate of Susann Kelly Kurz
Estimate $50,000-70,000
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