In the 1960s, Ibrahim Hussein was on a roll. Scholarships to study at Byam Shaw School of Drawing and Painting in London and then the prestigious Royal College / Academy, with prizes to boot. And then came the Fulbright and John D. Rockefeller III Fund Fellowship to tour the United States in 1967-1968. He arrived in New York in October 1967, and the next year was given back-to-back solos at the Newsweek Gallery and the Galerie Internationale. In the pamphlet at Galerie Internationale, 1095 Madison Avenue, New York, the London art critic Charles S. Spencer wrote: “He has an instinctive talent for making patterns so that the drawing of the figures, their centrality to the overall plane, and the every manner of applying his paint in whirling jabs, contribute to designs which are themselves always satisfying and at the same time underline the vitality and exuberance inherent in his pictorial aim.” In London, he already invented his ‘printage’, with a transfer of images and text from newspapers and magazines. In this work with the work cleaved into a diagonal with his figures rendered organically and in lines to simulate motion and dynamism. This was before his signature rhythmic lines in 1975, when he was resident artist at Universiti Malaya. Blinded in one eye (right) when small, Datuk Ibrahim Hussein is a Malaysian art phenomenon with international accolades in Japan (Japan Foundation Cultural Award, 1981), Venezuela (Order of Andres Bello, 1993) and Chile (Order of Bernardo O. Higgins). He was also a recipient of the highly prestigious World Economic Forum’s Crystal Award (1997). In 1986, Ib, as he is popularly known, was accorded a Retrospective by the National Art Gallery, Malaysia. He is the first Malaysian to have taken part in the Venice Biennale, under the aegis of the Smithsonian Institute. His other high points were when he exhibited with Andy Warhol and Salvador Dali at the Dhalat Abdulla Al-Salam Gallery in Kuwait in 1977, and when was awarded at the Monte Carlo exhibition. Ib organised two Asian Arts Festival at Club Med venues in Bali, Indonesia, in 1987, and in Cherating, Pahang, in 1988. When his Museum was completed in 2000, he organised the first Langkawi International Art Festival (Lifa).