KARACHI, Dec 19 (Reuters) - Ismail Gulgee, Pakistan's most prominent artist, was found murdered on Wednesday along with his wife and a maid in their Karachi home, police said. He was 81.

They said the three were found gagged in different rooms of the house, which is in the city's most upmarket district. The hands of his wife, Zarina, were tied.

"All three were suffocated. This happened around three days ago," said senior Karachi police officer Asif Ejaz Sheikh.

He said Gulgee's body was found in the bedroom, his wife's body in the kitchen and the maid in the main hall. The bodies were found by police after a neighbour complained of a bad smell.

Gulgee trained as an engineer in the United States before turning to painting works of modern art. He won various awards.

After starting out as a portrait painter, he turned to more abstract painting and became interested in Islamic calligraphy.

He produced numerous works using the different names of Allah, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York said on its Web site (www.metmuseum.org).

"In these textural works, Gulgee brings the Islamic calligraphy tradition to the modern practice of action painting such as that developed by the American artist Jackson Pollock," the museum said.

President Pervez Musharraf said on his Web site Gulgee was his "all-time favourite" artist. Musharraf condemned the killings, state television reported.

Gulgee was born in Peshawar in 1926. His son, Amin Gulgee, is a well-known sculptor. (Reporting by Imtiaz Shah; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Grant McCool)

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