Source: The Houston Chronicle
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/life/religion/6239025.html
Let’s get one thing straight: The Pakistani artist Jimmy Engineer is not and has never been an engineer.
But his father and grandfathers were, and it’s the custom among Zoroastrians, an ancient religion founded in Persia, to name families after their professions. He answers this very common question with patience, though it’s obvious there are other things he would rather discuss.
Standing in the middle of Houston’s Shangri-La art gallery, surrounded by 60 of his pieces, Engineer begins a wide-ranging conversation about his art, his social work in Pakistan and, above all, his hopes for peace.
That’s one of the reasons he has named his exhibit the Ideology of Peace.
“I want peace to prevail,” he said. “Whenever I show my work in Europe or the United States, it changes the mind of people when they look at it. For a moment they forget that I’m from Pakistan. They feel that I’m part of the international community, and it helps change their perception and image of my country, which is often negative.”
His work ranges from landscape and religious themes to cultural and abstract historical paintings, miniatures and pieces on war and philosophical issues.