A master fresco painter, a man of tall stature who revived the dying art of fresco by training a generation of young painters in the art, Ustad Saifur Rehman was born at Kamra Kalan, Attock, in 1942.
He was in junior school when lost his father who was a soldier and it was hard for him to continue his education.
“I came to Lahore at the age of 12 to live with my brother working for the Archeology Department. The beauty of colourful frescoes at Jahangir’s Tomb and Shalimar Gardens fascinated me. I started my career as a daily-wage labourer for one-and-a-half rupee to assist the artisans working for restorations of historical paintings,” he recalls.
“There was a shortage of traditional artisans, the archeology department instructed the master artisans to train the young people. I was lucky to become a student of Ustad Ahmad Buksh. I would prepare the colours and lift him up to the scaffold as he was too old and weak to climb up to paint the domes and ceilings. He was a humble fellow who taught me the basic techniques while restoring the artworks at Jahangir’s Tomb.”
Saifur Rehman worked for restoration of Shalimar Gardens, Lahore Fort, Hiran Minar and Begum Mariyam Zamani Mosque. After the death of Ustaad Ahmad Buksh I got attached with Ustad Ghulam Mohiuddin.
All the state-owned buildings were maintained by the PWD. On a visit to Masjid Wazir Khan, the then Punjab Governor Attiqur Rahman found them damaging the fresco to install the electric wiring in the early 1970s. He immediately called Archeology department director Waliullah Sahib and handed over the mosque to the department to restore all the artworks,” he recalls how the restoration of Masjid Wazir Khan began.