KARACHI: The air inside a Liaquatabad mechanic’s shop on a January evening in 2016 was thick with the smell of oil and gasoline. Amid the clang of wrenches and the growl of engines, a young worker, Behzad Ahmed Warsi, wiped grease from his hands, slipped into a quiet corner, pulled out a scrap of paper and began to draw.
That day, fate rolled in on four wheels. A car broke down near the shop, and behind the wheel was Shahid Rassam, a prominent Pakistani Canadian painter, sculptor and principal of an art school in Karachi.
While waiting for repairs, Rassam noticed the boy sketching.
“I saw a boy who wiped off oil and then went to sit in a corner, picked up a piece of paper, and started sketching on it,” Rassam recalled.
That fleeting scene, a moment of creativity in the midst of grease and noise, would alter the young mechanic’s life.
Rassam, who had long wanted to help artists from working-class backgrounds, called Warsi over.
“I asked, ‘Do you like drawing pictures?’ and he said, ‘Yes,’” Rassam said.
“This thought always remained in my heart to do something for those boys and girls who come from this area and from the middle class, who have no opportunity, who can’t even afford to buy a piece of paper or a pencil.”
He invited Warsi to his studio, marking the beginning of a transformative mentorship.
“From the end of 2016 onwards, I started working with him [Rassam],” Warsi, now 32, said. “That was when I saw and understood what professional art is, how it’s developed and what the whole process looks like.”
The only child of his parents, Warsi had been taking odd jobs to support his family. Seeing his determination, Rassam spoke to his parents.
“I spoke to his parents and got him to stop working at the mechanic shop,” Rassam said. “I told them, ‘Whatever little I can do, I will do it, because he has a passion for art.’”
He asked just one thing in return.
“Can you work hard day and night? It’s okay if there are no resources, that’s not a problem, but God has given you talent, and if you work hard, you can achieve a lot,” Rassam told him.
Warsi kept his word. He earned a scholarship at the Arts Council of Pakistan, Karachi, and completed a four-year diploma in 2022 with distinction, becoming a professional artist.
Today, Warsi’s hands are “dirty with colors,” as he puts it, not with oil. His chosen medium is oil paint, and his passion is surrealism.
“In this style, the imagery is realistic, but the paintings are based on symbolic elements,” he said. “The overall effect is dreamlike, it carries the feel of a dream.”
Much of his work explores the psychological and human dimensions of conflict.
“My topic is related to war,” he said. “The [Gaza] war that is going on these days, so in that, I show the shemagh [scarf] in such a way as if it’s very powerful or I show some kind of scenario.”
Animals, often crows, horses, or doves, also appear frequently in his paintings, representing “emotions” or “nations,” alongside fragmented human forms.
“Through drawings as well I am saying something,” he said.
His canvases now hang in exhibitions across Pakistan and abroad.
“I’ve participated in exhibitions held here in Pakistan, in Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad, and other cities,” he said. “In fact, some of my paintings have also made their way abroad to countries like Qatar, UAE, Canada, and India.”
Rassam says his student’s rise has been remarkable.
“This shows that a boy who didn’t even have sandals or bus fare, now, by the grace of God, he drives a car, his paintings sell, exhibitions are being held in different cities of Pakistan, and among the rising artists, he is at the very top.”
Now teaching at the Arts Council, Warsi spends long nights in his studio, painting the dreams that once hid behind grease-stained hands.
“If that day I hadn’t met Sir, or if he hadn’t passed by, then at that time, the grease that used to make my hands dirty, today, they wouldn’t be dirty in colors,” he said, smiling.
“Even if my hands still get dirty, they get dirty with colors,” he laughed, “and with those, I am making a painting and working for exhibitions.”
