The latest works of Shahid Rassam, a well-known Pakistani artist, aim at capturing the essence of some of the poems of Gulzar and Mirza Ghalib

For the past two years, Shahid Rassam, an artist from Pakistan, cherished a dream: of giving a visual form to Gulzar's poems. Shahid's efforts bore fruit when he finally met Gulzar during the latter's visit to Pakistan last year.

And with Gulzar giving Shahid the go-ahead, for the first time ever, his poetry will find resonance on canvas. Shakeel Adilzada, a well-known writer in Pakistan, will be selecting 50 poems by Gulzar in all.

Moreover, along with Gulzar's poetry, some poems by Mirza Ghalib too will find a new medium of expression. Shahid says that Gulzar will curate this section by selecting around 50 Ghalib poems that will then be translated onto canvas. `I was recently in Mumbai to discuss the same with Gulzar sahab and both my research and the selection process have already begun,` says the artist.

He further adds that he roped in Shakeel to choose from Gulzar's poems as the latter found it difficult to select from his own body of work. The exhibition is slated to take place in July-August this year.

`The second series of the exhibition will be held in November. We are still working on the dates, but in all likelihood, the first exhibition will be held in Karachi, followed by one in Mumbai and then Delhi. Post that, the exhibition will travel to Canada and UK, among other countries,` says Shahid, who will start work on the exhibition once he gets back to Pakistan next week.