Hanif was an Indian artist and designer working with typography. His preoccupation was reviving native languages graphically by abstracting their scripts to create striking text-based and mixed-media installations. Hanif led the Handpainted Type Project, which attempts to conserve and archive vernacular typography, a medium of expression represented in the streets of India that seems to have been lost.
Hanif has exhibited his works around the world at the London Design Biennale, Venice Biennale, Centre Pompidou Paris, Triennale Design Museum, Milan, and Sikka Art Fair Dubai among others. He is the co-founder of St+Art India Foundation, an institution known to have spearheaded the street art movement in India. In 2016, GQ magazine named Kureshi as one of the 50 most influential young Indians.
Hanif’s works were last shown with Wildstyle in Uppsala in June 2024 before he died in September 2024.