Centenary of National College of Arts, Lahore (March 15, 1976)

The stamp is horizontal and rectangular in shape. The right portion of the stamp portrays the insignia of the “National College of Arts” consisting of red and green colour crescent and five corner star enclosing the miniature of the citadel on blue ground in white pseudo-triangle. The insignia appears inside a sun shaped rosette consisting of a hundred colour diamond shape rays symbolizing the versatility of the fine arts, colour variety, the ways and means in which the arts can contribute to the promotion of culture and civilization as well as the number of years during which the institution has spread its light. The motto of the “National College of Arts” is reproduced at the bottom panel. The slogan “100 years of National College of Arts, Lahore (Mayo School of Arts)”appears in left side on blue panel as well as the country name ‘Pakistan in Urdu and English in red and the value ‘20 P’ and the word ‘Postage’ in black.

In October. 1975, the National College of Arts, Lahore completed a hundred years of its existence. In the course of its long hi story, this institution, which evolved from the original Mayo School of Arts, has played a vanguard role in the cultural life not only of Pakistan but of the subcontinent. Among the teachers and students associated with this institution are the names of some of the most eminent perso-nalities in the field of arts and crafts in the sub-continent.
The centenary celebrations of the National College of Arts, Lahore, is an event of considerable importance in the history of our Arts and Crafts. It not only presents us with an opportunity to look back upon the road the National College has traversed as an institution but also provides an occasion to examine, assess and analyze the past, to understand the present, and to determine the future.

HISTORY: The Mayo School of Arts was established in 1875 to train craftsmen to produce marketable “object of arts” Indeed, the Mayo School of Arts was actually born out of an arts and crafts exhi-bition held on the premises now occupied by the Tollinton Market in Lahore. Imme-diately after independence in 1947, the School suffered a series of setbacks, and in 1950 a scheme for reshaping and up-grading the institution to the status of a college was proposed. As a result, the National College of Arts, was activated in 1958 with the purpose of training profes-sionals in the fields of Commercial and Fine Art, Industrial Design and Architec-ture. In 1962, the College was taken over by the Department of Technical Education and reorganized on the lines of a Poly-technic Institute. In August 1963, it was placed under the administrative control of a Board of Governors. Since May 1972, the administrative control has been taken over by the Federal Ministry of Education and a reconstituted Board of Governors which includes students and staff representatives has been set up.

PRESENT FORM: The only institution of its kind in Pakistan, the National College of Arts, in its present form, aspires to play the role of a pioneer, pathfinder and pacesetter in the field of education related to the visual (and industrial) arts and environmental design in the country. In recent years it has done some vigorous re-examination of objective. and educational methods and structuring of courses and curricula etc., and has made its experience and expertise available to other national institutions. The College itself is now consi-dering plans to expand both in size and in the scope of its training programmes, to open up facilities in new areas such as the performing arts and audio-visual media, and to offer scholars opportunities for post graduate research.