Revue culturelle N°65

Palestinian Hala Jahlil was elected as the first vice-president, during the session in which the Children's Commission and the Activities and Events Commission were decided.

The Arab Parliament for Child is one of the institutions of the Arab League, with each member state represented by four children in this institution. It offers its members the opportunity to exercise their functions by providing the necessary training and supervision of the organisation of sessions.

The exhibition is held from 1 to 14 March at the Bab Rouah gallery. More than twenty female artists take part in the event initiated by the Arakane association, which works to promote contemporary art in Africa.

Several discussions are scheduled around different themes:

• "Female and plural contemporary art"
• "Crossed views on female African art dedicated to a cause"
• "Women in the legends of Africa".

The artistic and cultural space Riad Sultan will host on 24 February the first Ibn Battouta International Meeting for tolerance and rapprochement of peoples. This meeting is organised by the "Société d'Aménagement du Port de Tanger Ville" in collaboration with the Abdelhadi Tazi Foundation, on the occasion of the first anniversary of the inauguration of the Ibn Battouta Memorial Exhibition Space in Bordj En-Naâm in the old city of Tangier, which coincides with the celebration of the anniversary of the birth of explorer Ibn Battouta (719 years ago).

The event focuses on Ibn Battuta's travels and literature, with a particular emphasis on the port of Tangier Med. The explorer's works have been translated into more than fifty languages, which explains why experts from different countries have mobilised for the cultural event: Najib Ghiyati (representative of the Islamic World Organisation for Education, Science and Culture), Claudia M. Tresso (professor of Arabic languages and literature at the University of Turin in Italy), Yosr Tazi (president of the Abdelhadi Tazi Foundation), etc.

Photo : copyrights MAP.

Investigations regarding the discovery of a tombstone with a pre-Islamic inscription in "Tifinagh" are on-going. The National Institute of Archaeology and Heritage Sciences indicates that it was a tombstone with funerary inscriptions, in vertical line and in Libyques. This is the Amazigh letters used in ancient times, giving rise to modern Tifinagh.The Libyan or Punic inscriptions, generally Amazigh, date back to a few centuries before Christ, according to The National Institute of Archaeology and Heritage Sciences.

Photo : copyrights MAP.

Former president of the House of Representatives, politician and parliamentarian, Abdelwahad Radi, has just expressed his willingness to entrust his archives to the Archives of Morocco. The handing over ceremony of these archives is scheduled for the beginning of June 2023, on the occasion of the "International Week of Archives", informs a press release of the Archives of Morocco.

Born in 1935 in Sala, he was still very young when he got involved in politics. His personal archives will enrich the national memory. "His professional and political career translates and expresses the concerns, debates and commitments of this important period in the history of Morocco, Morocco under the Protectorate and contemporary and current Morocco (...) his archives will give to researchers and politicians an important testimony regarding the evolutions and complexity of the Moroccan political scene, whether it be local, regional, national or international" - press release of the Archives of Morocco.

The twenty-eighth edition will be held from 3 to 10 March 2023. Twelve films have been selected out of three hundred and fifty applications received. Among the Arab films, there are :

• "Alam" by Firas Khoury (Palestine),
• "Goldfish" by Abdeslam Kelai (Morocco),
• "Nezouh" by Soudade Kaadan (Syria),
• "The Dam, Al Sadd" by Ali Cherri (Lebanon),
• "A summer in Boujad" by Omar Mouldouira (Morocco),
• "Riverbed" by Bassem Brèche (Lebanon).

The festival has also chosen seven favourite films, including :

• "Mediterranean Fever" by Maha Haj (Palestine),
• "Island of Forgiveness" by Reda Bahi (Tunisia),
• "Hanging Gardens" by Ahmed Yassine Al Daradji (Iraq)
• « Queens » by Yasmina Benkiran (Morocco).

Photo : « Alam » by Firas Khoury.

Chaired by writer Bahaa Trabelsi, the commission is composed of Abdallah Abou Aoud, Bouchra Boulouiz, El Hassan Chaoui, Said Zribii, Jihane Bougrine, Sanae Ghouati and El Maati Kandil. The commission also includes Saadia Attaoui, representative of the Ministry of Youth, Culture and Communication - Department of Communication, Latifa Moftaqir, from the Department of Culture and Khadija Feddi, representative of the Moroccan Cinema Centre.

The award ceremony for the 11th edition of the "Dare Your Dreams" design competition was held on 24 February at the "Ecole Supérieure des Beaux-Arts" in Casablanca , on the initiative of Balsan and Darkyn.

The idea of the competition was to give the opportunity to seventeen designers to create new designs for French carpet manufacturer Balsan, in collaboration with Moroccan leader in floor and wall coverings Darkyn.

First prize went to Ayah El Hraichi, a fourth-year graphic design student. Her design is inspired by Moroccan heritage as well as by nature.

The National Library of the Kingdom of Morocco and the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences signed a cooperation protocol in the field of documentary heritage for 2023-2026.

This protocol aims to :

• develop cooperation between the two institutions in the field of documentary heritage, through the publication and exchange of research tools, expertise in the management of documentary holdings, with a focus on collection management, digitisation and restoration of documentary materials.
• enable the joint organisation of cultural and scientific activities on the history of the two countries.

Entitled "The magic of geometry", the exhibition displays the work of Melehi, who is a ceramist and writer, at the Mohammed VI Foundation for the promotion of social works in education and training.

Zellige, arcades, domes and minarets, ... The exhibition plays with the geometric forms of the Moroccan cultural heritage, interweaving its forms and symbols in an abstract and lyrical way.

Born in Assilah and graduated from the Marseille School of Arts and Architecture, Mohamed Amine Melehi participated in lots of solo and collective exhibitions in various galleries and institutions, in Morocco and abroad.

Photo: "Geometric Surrealism", Amine Melehi.

This new exhibition displays the latest work of the painter at the Dar D'art gallery, from February 24 to March 24. Always working between material, space and light, Hassan Echaïr focuses on the freedom of expression, "freed from temporal, spatial and dimensional limits" - to quote the event's press release. Between geometric forms and black and white colours, the painter offers different interpretations of this freedom.

Hassan Echair was born in Rommani. After studying Fine Arts in France and Morocco, he settled in Tetouan. His work is halfway between drawing, sculpture and installation.

Photo: "Ronds de Echaïr", Hassan Echaïr.

The event ended on 19 February with a new record. On the Jemaâ El Fna Square, a performance broke the record of a similar festival in Spain of forty-two hours of storytelling in a row, with a new record of fifty hours.

"We are delighted to have broken this world record as storytellers from all corners of the globe, paying homage to Jemaâ El Fna Square, an intangible heritage of humanity," said the Festival's president and co-founder, Mike Wood.

Placed under the high patronage of HM King Mohammed VI, this second edition brought together nearly ninety storytellers from around the world. The event was organised by the Union of Storytellers for Cultural Creativity and Storytelling and the World Storytelling Cafe. The theme was "Ancestral Voices".

The stories were told in Arabic, Darija, Amazigh, English, Spanish, German, Italian, French but also in Greek, Russian and Persian!

The director of the festival, Zouhir Khaznaoui, mentioned the launch of a storytelling school. The project, which is still on-going, will aim to teach the foundations and principles of storytelling to the younger generations and transmit the values of this oral and ancestral art.

Photo: copyrights Finances News Hebdo.

The latest single, shared on online listening platforms and social networks, was released for Valentine's Day. The track was written in collaboration with Younès Adam, composed by Mohamed Rifaï with an arrangement by Badr El Makhlouki. Sung in Darija, the track follows two other singles, "Tebka li ghir lemmima" (Only my mother remains) and "Kidayra Lemmima" (How are you mum). Ikram El Abdia will be in Belgium for a concert dedicated to women's rights on 8 March, and she will continue her European tour in Modena, Italy.

From 27 February to 5 March, the city hosts the "Wall Idia" event, which pays tribute to calligraphy with ten national and international artists whose works will cover the walls of Oualidia. The organiser of this initiative is Jean-Damien Zaccariotto (Switzerland). The idea is to boost tourism in the region during the winter season, but also to create bridges between Morocco and Switzerland. It is possible to discover the work of Moroccans Abderrajim Hamza and Chamach Raibi, as well as Swiss Simon Berger.

Moroccan film "Sharaa", by director Hussein Hanin, won the first prize of this ninth edition. The short film (19 minutes), which was screened for the first time in the Middle East and North Africa, tells the story of Assou, a man in his forties who loves his wife and daughter, but faces several challenges.

The Alexandria Short Film Festival (16-21 February), for which participated 75 films from 45 countries, honored many figures in the film industry, such as Egyptian actress Samaa Ibrahim, who received the "Hypatia Golden Shield", and film costume designer Refaat Abdelhakim.

The competition jury included Moroccan director and producer Malika Maa El Ainine, Egyptian director Sandra Nach'at and Italian critic Massimo Lecce.

In the "Arab Film Competition" section were :

• "Boumla" by Yazid Yato (Algeria);
• "The Great Secret of Bressim" by Sultan Rabie (Saudi Arabia);
• "What Happens in the Life of Nadine" by Amr Fikry (Egypt);
• "Sharaa" by Hussein Hanin (Morocco);
• "Hay" by Rawan Walid (Jordan);
• "Wahidane Afdhal" by Lerkar Barzan (Iraq);
• "Assafira" by Adel Abdel Majeed (Iraq);
• "Ittissal" by Karbim Al Yaqoubi (Tunisia).

Located in the former headquarters of Bank Al-Maghrib, the museum opened on 24 February, offering the opportunity to discover the history of the square and the city of Marrakech. According to the National Foundation of Museums, the place will showcase a collection of written descriptions, visual, audio and pictorial documents, as well as artistic works related to Jamaâ el-Fna Square.

Photo: Jamaâ el-Fna, February 2023, copyrights glob.art

The sixteenth edition of the fair takes place from 3 to 5 March in Madinat Jumeirah. Highlighting all kinds of arts, from street art to calligraphy, World Art Dubai's main objective is to democratize culture.

The Art Dubai 2023 gallery programme will feature works from nearly 40 countries and six continents, divided into four sections: Contemporary, Modern, Bawwaba and Art Dubai Digital. 

The first Dubai edition of Christie's Art+Tech Summit will also take place during Art Dubai. A series of Modern and Collector conferences organised in partnership with Dubai Collection is also scheduled, tackling sustainability. 

Art Dubai is under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum - Vice President, Prime Minister and Emir of Dubai. 

Photo: copyrights Gulf News.

Map My City is a project led by Lina Meskine, architect and member of Global Shapers Rabat. It was developed following a 2021 opening call for cultural and artistic projects by the French Institute of Morocco.

The Map My city project aims at creating a large embroidered map. It is a subjective one, made by embroiderers, who highlight the places that are dear to their hearts and their understanding of the history of Rabat. One thing leading to another, the embroidered map invites us to look at the city through the eyes of its inhabitants, and in particular its female ones. The idea was to :

• tell the story of Rabat from the point of view of the youth;
• put an emphasis on Moroccan embroidery, which is also an activity fostering the economic emancipation and empowerment of women;
• encourage and initiate embroiderers to explore the narrative potential of embroidery;
• address issues related to the city and social inclusion; encourage the social appropriation of public space, particularly by women.

This project was carried out in collaboration with the embroidery school in Salé. It was financed and supported by the Cooperation and Cultural Action Department of the French Embassy in Morocco, in partnership with the Moroccan non-profit association Global Shapers Rabat. The project was initiated by Lina Meskine: "I wanted to explore issues related to the city through an artistic project. Sensitive and mental maps have always interested me: they tell the story of the city through an individual experience. This is Kevin Lynch's phenomenological approach to urban planning, which looks at the space lived and perceived by the inhabitants." - interview in AE Magazine. The project "Map My City" ends on 4 March.

Photo: copyrights AE Magazine.

Until March 8, the artist exhibits forty-five paintings at the national museum of the city. This election is entirely inspired by the rock paintings of the Tassili N'Ajjer national park, the troglodyte city of Sifar and the red Tadrart massif of Djanet.

Nedjoua Seradj is originally from Sétif and studied design in Tunisia. Her artistic career has taken her to Greece, Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. She was awarded the Arab World Creativity Medal in Dubai in 2016.

The first edition of the national exhibition of plastic arts started on 25 February at the regional theatre Abdelkader Alloula of Oran. Its theme is "My Pen, My Identity". About twenty paintings are on display, belonging to disparate artistic movements, allowing a global vision of the contemporary Algerian artistic landscape. The participating artists are mainly based in Oran, but the wilayas of Khenchela, Tébessa, Batna, Tougourt and Aïn Temouchent are also represented.

The event, organised by the Abdelkader-Alloula regional theatre, the Ahmed Zabana National Public Museum, the Nadher publishing house and the Algerian Green Kheima cultural association, was inaugurated with the play "Euro Word", written and directed by Seghir Samia, president of the "Art Com" association, which deals with social issues.

Within the framework of this event, which ends on 27 February, an artistic workshop in the fields of sculpture and painting was scheduled at the Ahmed Zabana National Public Museum.

On this occasion, several cultural events were organised in the country including:

• exhibitions and conferences at the National Museum of Popular Arts and Traditions in Algiers, with a focus on the making of tarbouche with the craftsman Farid Dhimen
• a recital of chaâbi music at the Mahieddine-Bachtarzi National Theatre, organised by Algerian radio, which offered a repertoire of almost thirty songs, performed by Réda Doumaz, Noureddine Allane, Hakim El Ankis, Abdelkader Chaou and Mehdi Tamache, as well as the poet Yacine Ouabed
• The Arts and Culture Centre organised a study day on "The architecture and Islamic arts of the Kasbah", led by academics and researchers specialising in history and archaeology, with the aim of promoting this site, classified as a universal heritage site by UNESCO in 1992.

Photo: copyrights APS.

"We hope that these cultural days will allow us to discover our cultural heritage and strengthen our respective cultures, in order to highlight the most salient aspects of our specificities" - Abdel Malek Kettani, spokesman of the Council of Arab Ambassadors in Côte d'Ivoire.

The art and culture of fifteen countries were represented: Algeria, Comoros, Djibouti, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Tunisia and the United Arab Emirates.

This first edition included an exhibition of fifteen Arab countries highlighting the culture and heritage of the region. A musical evening was also planned, bringing together different artists from Morocco, Mauritania, Palestine, Lebanon, Tunisia and Algeria.

Photo: copyrights AA.

Organised by the German intermediary organisation for international cultural exchange in cooperation with Central Tunis and the Goethe-Institut Tunis, "The Event of a Thread" is curated by Inka Gressel and Susanne Weiss, in cooperation with Emna Ben Yedder and Soumaya Jebnouni. Between contemporary art installations, textile sculptures known as soft sculptures, contemporary embroidery, weaving, thread drawing, needle painting, textile paintings and video art, the exhibition puts the emphasis on work created by foreign artists, but also by Tunisians.

The travelling exhibition will continue until 11 March at the Cultural Space in Tunis. In this context, the Centre des Arts Vivants in Rades will open its doors on 4 March for a visit to the tapestries of Safia Farhat (1924 - 2004), in the presence of the artist's niece, Aïcha Filali.

Safia Farhat is a pioneer of the plastic arts in Tunisia, a draughtswoman, painter, ceramist, upholsterer and decorator. She contributed to the reform of art education. She was the first Tunisian director of the School of Fine Arts in Tunis, where she taught at the end of the 1950s. With her husband, she created the Centre des arts vivants de Radès, which they donated to the Tunisian state. She created stained glass windows, drawings, paintings, bas-reliefs, frescoes and especially decorative tapestries.

Photo : copyrights Kapitalis.

After eleven years, the rehabilitated monument Tourbet-El-Bey was inaugurated in the presence of the head of government Najla Bouden Romdhane, accompanied by the Minister of Cultural Affairs Hayet Guettat Guermazi, the governor of Tunis Kamel Feki, the mayor of the city of Tunis Souad Abderrahim as well as several representatives of the Agency for the Development of Heritage and Cultural Promotion and the National Institute of Heritage. It is the largest funerary monument in Tunis.

Photo: copyrights La Presse de Tunisie.

In solidarity with the victims of the recent earthquakes in Syria and Turkey, the Ministry of Cultural Affairs has announced that a charity concert will take place on 28 February, at 7.30 pm, at the Opera Theatre. All proceeds will go to the victims in Turkey and Syria. The concert will be performed by artist Lotfi Bouchnak.

Born in Tunis, Lotfi Bouchnak is a Tunisian singer and composer, who also happens to be an ambassador of peace at the United Nations.

Launched on 25 February in the different regions of the republic, this centenary is the occasion for screenings Tunisian films. The celebration includes all film formats, from short to feature films.

This event is organised by the National Cinema and Image Centre, in partnership with the Department of Cultural Action and the Regional Affairs Office at the Ministry of Cultural Affairs, the Tunisian Federation of Amateur Filmmakers, the Tunisian Federation of Film Clubs and the Tunisian Association for the Promotion of Film Critics.

The celebration of the Centenary of Tunisian Cinema was officially launched on 21 December 2022 at the Cité de la Culture. This date coincided with the release, one hundred years ago, of the very first Tunisian film "Zohra" by Albert Chikli, which was screened for the first time on 21 December 1922.

A Roman historical site was discovered in the Ibn-Khaldoun City, in the city of Le Kef, north-west of Tunisia.

The representative of the National Heritage Institute (INP) in Kef, Abdelkarim Loubiri, said that it is probably a site from the Roman period. This new discovery is composed of a flat ground and three tombs, whose sizes are identical with those of the tombs found on the sites of the Roman period, the curator said.

Their film, "The Caterpillars", made for the sixteenth Lyon Biennale, tells the story of the difficulties of emigration, exile and integration. The story starts from the exploitation of women for the cultivation of silkworms in Mount Lebanon centuries ago. The link is made with the daily life of Asma and Sarah, two Syrian and Lebanese waitresses, in the heart of Lyon. The music by Zeid Hamdan and Lynn Adib, produced especially for the film, could be an allegory of the short movie: a meeting between two cultures and two regions of the world.

Michelle and Noel Keserwany denounce the socio-political dysfunctions in Lebanon, and their YouTube videos reach record audiences. This short film, full of poetry, is their first film shot in France.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52agQXp_UB0

Photo: Michelle and Noël Keserwany, 25 February 2023, Berlinale, copyrights Reuters.

The al-Bustan Festival ends on 19 March with a programme ranging from classical music to jazz, including Lebanese songs, and organising a series of educational and solidarity events alongside the concerts. The inauguration took place on 23 February with the Symphonie espagnole by French composer Édouard Lalo (1823-1892), revisited as a violin concerto.

The full programme is available at https://bit.ly/3ktg8xe

Photo: "Find the four brilliant young musicians playing with Renaud Capuçon tonight: Violaine Despeyroux, viola, Manon Galy, violin, Maxime Quennesson, cello, Jorge Gonzalez Buajasan", text and copyrights @albustanfestival on Instagram.

The Beirut-based artists' residence, founded and directed by Zeina Saleh Kayali, has taken on the mission of offering high-level masterclasses to young Lebanese musicians.

Thus, a violin masterclass with Arnaud Nuvolone, first violin of the national orchestra of the Opera of Paris, was held in February with, at the same time, a concert by soprano Lara Jokhadar, mezzo-soprano Natasha Nassar and pianist Betty Kourtian.

Seven student selected by concertmaster of the Lebanese Philharmonic Orchestra, Mario Rahi, took part in the training, which ended with a concert featuring works by Bach, Tchaikovsky, Paganini, Beethoven, Suk, Kreisler and by Lebanese composer Boghos Gelalian.

Arnaud Nuvolone said he was overwhelmed by the students' thirst for learning and their tenacity, even though they face so many difficulties in their daily lives.

Photo: copyrights L'Orient-le-Jour

The multidisciplinary artist who passed away at the end of 2021 is honoured at a symposium at the American University of Beirut, held on 23 and 24 February. The event focuses on the Lebanese artist's writings. The idea was organised by Etel Adnan's former campaigner, Simone Fattal, in association with two friends, historian Fawwaz Traboulsi and Arabic literature specialist Sonja Mejcher-Atassi.

"Etel Adnan is better known for her painting than for her literary writings. The Lebanese people do not have access to her books, which are scattered and poorly distributed. This is why I asked each speaker to discuss a particular book of hers." - Simone Fattal, for media L'Orient-le-Jour.

Indeed, the artist has invited several of their close friends to the symposium: historian Fawwaz Traboulsi, Arab literature specialist Sonja Mejcher-Atassi, publisher Hans-Ulrich Müller-Schwefe, visual artist Lamia Joreige, director of the Poetry Center at the University of San Francisco Steve Dickison, Lebanese writer Dominique Eddé and Francesca Maria Corrao, specialist in Arab literature at the University of Rome.

The symposium's programme is intended to be as eclectic as Etel Adnan's work, with panels on her life, her childhood in Beirut, her poetry, ... Concerts at the al-Madina theatre are also scheduled, as well as screenings of films tackling Etel Adnan's work. A movie directed by artist Joana Hadjithomas is scheduled as well.

Photo: copyrights Connaissance de Arts.

The artist gives a new show, or rather a conference-performance, on 23 February at the Mina Image Center.

Lily Abichahine was trained to be a lawyer, she decided at the age of thirty to devote herself to art. She is particularly interested in the Mediterranean sea and its myths.

Following her first artistic residencies between Palermo and Beirut in 2021, the "Mare Nostrum" project was born, which is divided into two chapters. The first one, entitled "Choregraphy for a Woman and a Stone", explores the myth of Sisyphus, putting into perspective the cities destroyed by the earthquakes in Italy and the double explosion of August 4th in Beirut.

The second chapter, "Secrets of the Infinite Sea", is a journey between Izmir (Turkey) and Marseille (France), which focuses on Prometheus, both a hero and a victim.

"When I started this project, the aim was to explore the links and bridges between these cities, and to go beyond the simplistic contemporary terms and divisions, such as Schengen, borders, Global South, Europe, or visas that keep people apart from each other. In this way, we remind people that this basin, under the Roman Empire, was a lake governed by a single Roman law and that we had something unifying that we have lost. - Lily Abichahine, interview by media L'Orient-le-Jour.

Photo: "Secrets of the Infinite Sea" conference-performance with Lily Abichahine, copyrights Souraya Hammoud.

Just like the event of last June, the French Institute in Beirut offers another original evening with Live Magazine on the occasion of the Night of Ideas, with performances simultaneously translated in Arabic.

Live Magazine is a living newspaper, a unique evening, during which journalists, photographers, cartoonists and directors take turns on a stage to tell - in words, sounds and images - a story each. Intimate and global stories, fundamental for those who tell them, unforgettable for those who listen to them, 100% ephemeral, 99% true.

Two evenings are organised on the theme of "Plus?". Participating Speakers are cartoonist Mathieu Sapin, essayist Nicole Marchand-Zanartu, journalists Julien Ricour-Brasseur/Philippe Hage Boutros/Valentine Faure, and photographer Barbara Iweins.

More information on https://bit.ly/41FHvFg

This is the artist's first solo exhibition in over forty years. It is held at the Sfeir-Semler gallery until April 15. The exhibition traces Haddad's pictorial work over the last fifty years of his artistic practice between Lebanon and the United States, and shows a unique collection of works from the early 1970s, shown here for the first time. In particular, the exhibition displays the artist's collages, which were created at the peak of his exploration of colour and form. Each collage begins with a basic painting using acrylic, oil, gouache, watercolour and graphite, among other materials.

When asked about his technique, Haddad says: "I have no formula, I have no story".

Farid Haddad is a Lebanese-American artist who grew up in Lebanon just before the civil war, at a crucial moment in the history of Lebanese and Arab modernism. This exhibition considers Haddad's work as a key chapter in the history of abstraction and minimalism in the region. "For the Age of Lebanon" covers the artist's earliest works, produced between 1971 and 1977, as well as his most recent works, from 2017 to 2022.

Photo: Farid Haddad, "Where do you want me to go?", Mixed Media Collage on Paper, Exhibition view, "For the Age of Lebanon", 2023, copyrights Sfeir Semler Gallery Beirut.

This is Fatima El Hajj's new solo exhibition at the Mark Hachem Gallery in Beirut. It is open until 7 March. The large format canvases show nature in all its states, always with bright colours, which wish to convey the artist's joie de vivre. The characters are reminiscent of the myths of Antar and Abla or Tristan and Isolde. Fatima El-Hajj's landscapes are inspired by the parks and gardens of the cities she has observed and loved during her travels in Lebanon, Yemen, Morocco and France.

Born in Lebanon in 1953, Fatima El-Hajj graduated in 1978 from the Institute of Fine Arts of the Lebanese University, then from the Academy of Fine Arts in Leningrad and finally in 1983 from the "École nationale supérieure des arts décoratifs" in Paris. She has been teaching at the Beirut Institute of Fine Arts since 1985, the year she won the Prix Picasso in Madrid. Since 1986, she regularly exhibits in Lebanon, in several Arab countries where she is known and recognized (Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Syria, Morocco, Qatar, ...), in Spain and in France.

Photo: "Détente Musicale", Fatima El Hajj, 2017, acrylic and oil on canvas, 150 x 190 cm.

Saleh Barakat's Agial Gallery hosts a solo exhibition of the artist, entitled "Out of the Box", which is the first one ever organised in Lebanon. The exhibition features geometric works, which employ a unique process of black ink and sugar applied directly to the canvas. His works is a fragile equilibrium between oder and chaos, the known and the unknown.

Alaa Sharabi holds an undergraduate degree and a master's degree in printmaking from Damascus University, Syria, where he was also employed as a printmaking assistant. Since 2018, he has been working at the Sharjah Art Foundation and teaching printmaking at the Sharjah Art Institute.

On view until 25 March.

Photo: copyright Syria.art

This is the new exhibition of Lebanese artist Hiba Kalache at Saleh Barakea Gallery in Beirut. Ethereal, corporeal and scriptural, the artist's work reveals tensions between the abstract and the concrete. Canvas and paper are marked with vivid colours, which form a constellation of parallel conversations, inspirations and struggles.

Hiba Kalache was born in Beirut and now lives in California. She recently participated in the FOG show with Altman Siegle Gallery in San Francisco. Her solo exhibitions include "Our Dreams are a Second Life" (2020) and "Lemonade Everything Was So Infinite" (2018), at Saleh Barakat Gallery in Beirut. She has participated in numerous group exhibitions around the world.

Photo: "Madness sings in the morning", Hiba Kalache, 2022.

It could have been a catchphrase, but it is the motto of the new exhibition of the Lebanese gallery Chaos, taking place from February 10 to March 10, and inviting ten Lebanese artists from different disciplines and backgrounds.

Painters, sculptors, ceramists, ... It is a mosaic of arts and personalities gathered in one event. Bronze ceramics by Sabine Karam, black and white paintings by Serge Oryan, marine universe by Zena Yachoui, coloured canvases by Missak Terzian, ... It is a Lebanese melting-pot that the Chaos gallery proposes to discover.

Photo: painting by Jad El Khoury, copyrights Ici Beyrouth.

Najran has the ambition to become a famous place for rural tourism in the upcoming years, justifying an operation to restore its mud houses, castles and palaces. The owners of the old residences as well as the inhabitants have taken on the restoration projects as part of a patriotic initiative to preserve the history, identity and authenticity of the valley.

Photo: some of the old houses, called darb, are recognisable by their remarkable geometric architecture. They consist of seven to nine floors. The top floor, usually reserved for the head of the family, consists of a single room that usually has a view of the ocean. A well is located at the entrance of the house.

The Royal Commission for AlUla, in partnership with the Saudi Equestrian Federation and the International Equestrian Federation, will host the fourth edition of the 120km endurance race on 4 March, with nearly 200 of the world's best riders. The competition route aims to showcase and promote the richness and beauty of the Saudi landscape.

Photo: copyrights Endurance Lifestyle Facebook account.

The Saudi-American company is run by the duo Hicham Fageeh and Sultan Tamer, who intend to use Dh'bab Production as a platform to produce films which reflect Saudi culture, away from the orientalist clichés and racist stereotypes which Hollywood tends to push forwards. In addition, the duo wants to produce Saudi comedies, horror films and blockbusters.

"We want to make cinema a tradition in our country, especially with the opening of many venues" - Hicham Fageeh for the online media Arab News.

Dh'bab Production currently has two projects:

• "Grave Sin": a horror film set in Saudi Arabia and revolving around Aziz, who reluctantly leaves Japan to console his grieving mother by building her a new home.
• "The Tribe": a TV series filmed in Saudi Arabia. It tells the story of a group of high school students from Jeddah who survive a bus crash in the world's largest desert, Rub al-Khali, and discover the supernatural secrets of an ancient buried city.

The Baghdad Museum, founded in 1926, has been closed and reopened several times in recent years, being one of the first victims of political events. Closed in 2019 following the protests and then the Covid-19 pandemic, the museum reopened in March 2022.

"From today, the museum will also open every Friday to welcome Iraqi families and tourists free of charge, from 9am to 5pm" - director of the Iraqi Council of Antiquities, Laith Majid Hussein, for French Press Agency.

Iraq is the cradle of the civilisations of Sumer, Akkad, Babylon and Assyria, to whom humanity owes writing and the first cities. The country has suffered from looting and trafficking in antiquities, both as a result of the US invasion and the activities of the Islamic State. Of the 15,000 pieces stolen from the museum, the authorities have only been able to return a third.

Photo: view of the museum on 24 February 2023, copyrights French Press Agency.

His Highness Sheikh Saud bin Saqr Al Qasimi, Member of the Supreme Council of the United Arab Emirates and Ruler of Ras Al Khaimah, officially opened the eleventh edition of the annual festival on 3 February. While the event is coming to an end (28 February), the open-air exhibition will continue until 31 March.

The UAE festival has brought together more than 120 local and international artists from around 30 countries. The theme of the 2023 event was nature, highlighting the need to preserve and promote natural heritage.

Film screenings, gastronomic experiences, conferences and exhibitions, etc. The programme is rich and is in line with a logic of sustainability, well aware that Dubai will host the Conference of the Parties 28 at the end of the year.

Photo: copyrights "What's on".

The project aims to develop the skills of non-native Arabic teachers and train them to teach Arabic to certain standards. The training will be implemented in cooperation with universities and specialised institutes and also seeks to promote the Arabic language globally through courses taught by Arabic experts.

The second phase of the project includes 18 courses in Saudi Arabia and 39 courses abroad. It builds on the success of the first phase, in which five training courses were given in the Kingdom, with 96 participants. Outside the Kingdom, 30 courses were held in 26 countries, with 809 participants (Arab News).

Photo: copyrights École Gauthier.

Absent from the Egyptian cultural landscape last year, the festival is back in 2023 from 13 to 20 October in the seaside town next to the Red Sea. The festival is organised under the patronage of festival founder Samih Sawiris, headed by artistic director Intishal al-Timimi.

The festival was established in 2017 and has since become a must-see event for the film industry in the Middle East.

It aims to share the space with local and emerging artists; to nurture experimentation, collaborations and to encourage knowledge transmission through artist-given workshops. I am delighted that El Gouna continues to be the home of one of our most constructive cultural activities." - Samih Sawiris. 

Presentation by Orients Publishing: "For more than ten centuries Scheherazade has fired our imagination, but her own words had hardly ever been heard. Taha Hussein makes her speak as she has become Queen; she relieves her husband by continuing to distil tales of wisdom and duty. It is the first time that this story is translated into French. André Miquel offers us a magnificent farewell to a text about the woman saviour. Dia Azzawi, great Iraqi painter, completes the portrait of this absolute heroine with fifteen drawings, details and the cover of this book.

The translation of Taha Hussein's novel was done by Philippe Vigneux.

Photo: cover of the book.

#CommunityStoriesMENA is a video series that tells the unique stories of four Facebook community leaders in Egypt, Lebanon and Morocco:

• Hala Dahrouge from Lebanon, founder of LibanTroc in 2019, which provides essential assistance to Lebanese families affected by the ongoing economic crisis https://bit.ly/41zl18T
• Marouan Zitane from Morocco, founder of the Moroccan Travellers' Community, a group sharing experiences and good addresses in the Kingdom https://bit.ly/3EJlR9j
• Rania Atef from Egypt, founder of the support group for women entrepreneurs "I Make This!", which gives them a platform to promote their productshttps://bit.ly/3ktO9h8
• Ibrahim Safwat from Egypt, creator of a large sports and running group in his country, "Cairo Runners", enabling his community to run every Friday but also organising the Cairo Half Marathon which is to date the largest running event in Egypt with over 5,000 participants. https://bit.ly/2PCgAJ9

Launched by Meta on 21 February, this series focuses on the role of social networks as a tool for social bonding, telling the inspiring stories of people who have used social networks to improve the lives of their communities.

The Berlin-based Palestinian artist releases this music video for the launch of her album "Amrat", which was out in late January 2023. The title is about an urban love story. The song is based on a very minimal arrangement, which plays with synths and is intended to be fuzzy, blurry. Rasha Nahas will soon be performing at the Arab World Institute in Paris for the Arabofolies festival on 18 March. 

A sublime track by the Lebanese band, looking back at the current crisis in the country of the Cedar, with lyrics sung in English that tell of the confinement, the economic collapse, the 4th of August 2020, ... The voice of Sandra Arslanian, the band's singer, is clear, distant and delicate.

Trained in Switzerland and at "Le Cordon Bleu" in London before moving to France to work at the "Plaza Athénée", she is now one of the jurors of TV show "The Taste" at only 27.

At the beginning of this year, Mona Mosly collaborated with the VOX cinemas in Riyadh and Jeddah to create a menu of twenty dishes, revisiting oriental gastronomy: nachos kibbeh, bao with barbecued chicken, Armenian tabbouleh, chicken dukka madani burger, halva biscuits with Syrian ice cream, Thai curry, etc.

"Cinema brings joy. I believe I can also bring joy to people with my food. And it's all about happiness, isn't it?" - from Arab News.

Photo: Armenian tabbouleh by Mona Mosly.

In addition to the success of the Keserwany sisters in winning the Golden Bear for Short Film for their wonderful "Caterpillars", the Berlinale was also marked by the participation of the first Yemeni film in the competition, "The Burdened", by director Amr Gamal.

Shot in the director's hometown, Aden, the film follows the struggle of the couple Isra'a and Ahmed which tries to escape misery and poverty. Pregnant with her fourth child, Isra'a wants an abortion. The operation is compromised by the lack of resources as well as by the conservatism of the society. The script is inspired by a true story. 

"I love my city very much and I think it should be documented and shown to the world - the heritage, the buildings, the streets, the culture" - Amr Gamal. 

Photo: "The Burdened" is Gamal's second feature film, following "Ten Days Before The Wedding" released in 2018. Copyrights mad-distribution.film

Street-art, various installations, exhibitions, film screenings, concerts, ... The eleventh edition of the cultural festival takes over the Al Fahidi district in Dubai. The theme of this year's event is "New creativity. Same Path", with a wide variety of creative works and exhibitions to be seen until 5 March.

Some works not to be missed:

• "Threads of Time: weaving history on a blank canvas" by Emirati artists Hamda Ahmad Al Falahi and Reema Al Mheiri: the interactive installation celebrates weaving as an essential part of the national heritage.
• Hanady Badow's Emirati dolls tell the story of the evolution of clothing and of the status of women in the UAE.
• The plastic dress of Sharjah Performing Arts students want to draw attention to sustainable and ethical fashion, proving that everyday materials can be recycled into surprising art objects.
• Mai Majdy's paintings celebrate women's power with brightly coloured portraits and confident poses.
• Melika Shahin's installation, entitled "Shahin", explores the relationship between heritage, belonging and escape from reality.
• Ali Bahmani's installation "Mirrorigami" is a collection of mirrors with infinite reflections, whose arrangement is influenced by the art of origami.

Photo: painting by Egyptian artist Mai Majdy.

The story of this Night 352 is the tale of enslaved princess Zumurrud and Ali Shar. The latter inherits a large fortune which he squanders in no time. He wanders around, hungry, until he finds Zumurrud for sale on a slave market. The two fall in love and live together until Zumurrud is kidnapped. The story continues with Ali's quest to find Zumurrud.

The version staged at the Cultural Foundation in Abu Dhabi was revisited by Iraqi playwright Hazim Kamaledin, who decided to do a tale about contemporary slavery.

Composer and leading qanun musician Osama Abdulrasol teamed up with the Brussels Jazz Orchestra and Lebanese singer Wehbe for a unique performance combining classical Arabic music and jazz.

"I want to take jazz, big band or orchestra, to a level they don't know. And I also want to take Arabic music to a new level". - Osama Abdulraso for newspaper The National.

The Arab League celebrates the Arab Cultural Heritage Day on 27 February, with a main focus on popular heritage, which is not sufficiently considered despite its importance according to the Secretary General of the Arab League.

The celebration was held in the "Andalusian Hall", located at the headquarters of the General Secretariat of the University in Cairo, in the presence of official and academic personalities, and representatives of Arab and international organisations. The ceremony featured artistic performances of Arab folklore, including from Egypt, Palestine and Yemen.

Photo: copyrights Al Mayadeen.

The Palestinian visual artist died at the age of 67. He was one of the founders of Al Aqsa University in Gaza.

The Egyptian poet died. He was an emeritus member of the Egyptian Writers' Union, head of the Egyptian General Authority for Cultural Palaces and secretary general of the Egyptian Writers' Conference.

The joint Egyptian-Spanish archaeological mission between the Supreme Council of Antiquities and the University of Barcelona operating in the area of al-Bahnasa in the governorate of Minya, discovered limestone tombs from the Roman period, and individual tombs from the Persian period, as well as sixteen necropolises dating from the Byzantine and Coptic periods.

Photo: copyrights Al Mayadeen.

The 27th edition of the fair started at the Oman Convention and Exhibition Center and will be held until March 4, 2023. 826 publishing houses from 32 countries are participating, with around 100 cultural activities planned (exhibitions, conferences, film screenings, etc.). The opening ceremony of the book fair took place on 22 February under the patronage of Sayyid Hamoud Faisal Al Busaidi, Minister of Interior.

Photo: copyrights Al Mayadeen.

The first session of the Sharm el-Sheikh Arab Film Festival will start on 1 May, during which the Egyptian actress Poussi (Safinaz Qadry), the Egyptian actor Adel Imam, and films with the Egyptian writer Taha Hussein as the main subject will be honoured. The festival's jury is also known. It is composed of Egyptian director Inas Al Degheidy, photographer Sameh Selim, Dean of the Higher Institute of Cinema Mohsen Altouni, Egyptian writer Ibrahim Abdel Meguid, and Sheikha Alyazia bent Nahyan ben Mubarak Al Nahyan, Ambassador of Culture for ALECSO.

These files concern the female songs "Sraoui" and "Acewiq" from the Kabylie region, "Ayay" from the wilayas of Laghouat and Biskra, the Châabi El Assimi, El Malouf, El Hawzi, El Haoufi and other musical genres, explained the director of the National Centre for Prehistoric, Anthropological and Historical Research, Slimane Hachi.

The wedding costume Chedda Tlemcenienne, the Couscous, the Raï song, the celebration of Sbiba, the celebration of the mawlid Ennabaoui "Seboua" of Timimoune, the traditional song "Ahlil" of Gurara, the procession of the Ouled Sidi Cheikh and the traditional system of irrigation and water distribution "Fougara", have been previously designated as world heritage by UNESCO.

Photo: copyrights Al Mayadeen.

A number of Iraqi artists from the Al-Ghadeer Fine Arts Studio in the city of Basra spent the weekend drawing their perceptions of the devastating earthquake that hit Syria and Turkey, to show the devastation and tragedy which both countries have now experienced.

Photo: Basra, Al-Farahidi Street, copyrights Al Mayadeen.

Syrian artist Iman Omar is behind the puppet show entitled "The Heart of a Doll", written and directed by Iraqi Hussein Harf, as part of the activities of the "Fujairah International Monodrama Festival", an achievement uniting Syria and Iraq through a joint agreement between the artists' unions of both countries.

The show begins with a short film, in which a puppeteer is portrayed, questioning his role in theatrical performance. The play was followed by a seminar with the actors and puppeteers.

The play "The Heart of the Doll" will participate in the International Festival of Monodrama in Carthage, next May.

Photo: copyrights Al Mayadeen.

The Royal Opera House inaugurated on 22 February the photography exhibition entitled "The Royal Opera House Muscat through Omani Eyes", which aims at celebrating the photographers who have captured the beauty of the building's architecture over the past decade.

The exhibition features thirty photographs who tell the story of the opera house. A film also provides an in-depth analysis of the architecture of the Royal Opera House and the House of Musical Arts.

The exhibition also includes a section celebrating the work of two of the Sultanate's most prominent photographers, Muhammad bin Al-Zubayr and Khaled Al-Busaidi.

This event is open until 20 March 2023.

Photo: copyrights Al Mayadeen.

As part of the International Book Fair taking place in the Sultanate's capital, a cultural week celebrating Bahrain has been organised, focusing in particular on the relationship between the two countries. Until 4 March, poetry and song evenings, plays, conferences and the screening of documentaries about Bahrain are scheduled.

Let's take a look at Tareq Imam's latest book, shortlisted for the prestigious International Prize for Arabic Fiction.

We are in Cairo in 2045. The Cairo Work Gallery, an independent art gallery dedicated to marginalised arts, announces that it offers a grant to create a model of Cairo in 2020, when the city was still the capital of Egypt.

The novel explores the capital at four different periods of its history: 2045, 2020, 2011 and an unknown time in the distant future, with an independent artist speaking for each period.

There is Urija, an avid model maker of the city who has suffered the stigma of being blamed for his father's death since he was a child; Noud, a documentary filmmaker under police surveillance since her release from prison, who was convicted of offending public morals in her last film; Balardo, a street artist from the Arab Spring, who is pursued by the police for defacing the city's walls; and Manga, an illustrator.

While the different periods of time intersect, the location remains the same. "Cairo Maquette" explores the city's relationship with individuals, and in particular with its artists, marginalized, in search of their identity, rejected by the state as well as by society.

Tareq Imam is an Egyptian novelist and journalist born in 1977. He is the deputy editor of Cairo Radio and Television magazine. He has started his writing career at a young age, publishing his first collection of short stories, "New Birds Unspoiled by the Air", at the age of eighteen. He has published eleven books of novels and short stories, including "The Calm of Killers" (2007), "The Second Life of Constantine Cavafis" (2012), "My Father's Shrine" (2013), "The City of Endless Walls" (2018), and "The Taste of Sleep" (2019).

"Camera Palaestina: Photography and Displaced Histories of Palestine," published by the University of California Press, is a critical exploration of Jerusalemite chronicler Wasif Jawhariyyeh (1904–1972) and his seven photography albums entitled "The Illustrated History of Palestine".

Jawhariyyeh’s nine hundred images narrate the rich cultural and political milieu of Ottoman and Mandate Palestine.

Authors Nassar, Sheehi, and Tamari locate this archive at the juncture between the history of photography in the Arab world and the social history of Palestine. Shedding new light on this foundational period, the authors explore not just major historical events and the development of an urban bourgeois lifestyle but a social field of vision of Palestinian life as exemplified in the Jerusalem community. Tracking the interplay between photographic images, the authors offer evidence of the unbroken field of material, historical, and collective experience from the living past to the living present of Arab Palestine.

A quick biography of the authors:

• Issam Nassar is Chair of History at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies and co-editor of the Jerusalem Quarterly. He is co-author of "The Storyteller of Jerusalem: The Life and Times of Wasif Jawahariyyeh and Gardens of Sand".
• Stephen Sheehi is Sultan Qaboos Professor of Middle East Studies and Director of the Decolonizing Humanities Project at William & Mary. He is coauthor of "Psychoanalysis Under Occupation: Practicing Resistance in Palestine" and author of "The Arab Imago: A Social History of Indigenous Photography, 1860–1910".
• Salim Tamari is Senior Fellow at the Institute for Palestine Studies and Director of its Jerusalem Studies Program. He is also Professor of Sociology, Emeritus at Birzeit University and the author of "The Great War and the Remaking of Palestine, Year of the Locust, and The Mountain Against the Sea".

The Tunisian cultural scene lost the writer, politician and former Minister of Culture Bechir Ben Slama, who died on February 23, at the age of 92.

As part of the seventeenth edition of the Spring Festival of Culture, artist and Dr Mayassa Al-Suwaidi presents her exhibition "The Golden Ratio" which explores the link between art and mathematics. 

"Thanks to my studies in mathematics and my specialisation in this field, I am naturally attracted to equations and geometric shapes. They appear in my paintings, I put them there unconsciously in my drawings, my compositions, my colourings, ...". - words taken from the newspaper Al Mayadeen.

The Ministry of Culture and Arts has issued a directive to all officials in the sector to inform them that "all programming and broadcasting of vulgar songs is henceforth prohibited during official cultural events" in Algeria. The directive urges all those in charge of the culture sector to prohibit any programming and broadcasting of songs whose lyrics are contrary to "good morals" and which constitute a "public outrage to modesty". The Ministry of Culture and the Arts explains that the aim of this ban is to "block drifts that undermine the principles and values of society", and refers "to the fourth commitment of the President of the Republic, Abdelmadjid Tebboune, who insisted on the need for moralization of political and public life and the latest orientation relating to the law on the prevention of drugs and narcotics and the repression of drug trafficking".

This new exhibition organised by the National Museums Foundation and the Arab World Institute is held at the Mohammed VI Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Rabat from March, 1st.

Enriched by recent major donation from Lebanese collectors Claude & France Lemand, this selection of works from the Institute of the Arab World is shown for the first time at another institution. It presents a rich panorama of the avant-garde of the plural modernities of the countries of the Arab world from 1945 to the present day, with a majority of paintings but also sculptures, photographs and graphic works.

Sixteen Arab countries are represented in the exhibition: Morocco, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt, United Arab Emirates, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Palestine, Qatar, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, Yemen.

The event is divided into four parts:

• "A mirror of the Arab World: Inspiring Traditions": this first part looks at the reappropriation by Arab artists of their heritage, free of all occidentalism. Artists from the Mashreq and the Maghreb reinvested their pre-Islamic heritage: rock art in Algeria, Mesopotamian art in Iraq, Pharaonic art in Egypt, Nabataean art in Jordan and Roman art in Lebanon. Ancient civilisations and archaeological remains inspired artists, some of whom were experts in their own right (Adam Henein or Dia Al Azzawi).
• "Plural territories of abstraction: national and international statements": this second part focuses on abstract art in the Arab world from the 1960s onwards, which draws on popular forms (tattoos, talismans, graffiti, etc.).
• "Between bruises and hopes, the weight of History": this third part tackles art and the Arab world facing the rise of nationalism and socialism in a context of Cold War and decolonization. Lebanese, Sudanese, Palestinian, Iraqi, Libyan and Syrian artists bear witness to totalitarianism, civil wars, terrorism and exile.
• "And tomorrow? A human condition on the move": the exhibition concludes with the reappropriation of the body through plastic arts in an Arab world which integrates nudes in its art. The human condition, introspection and existential questioning are recurring themes for many artists: Lebanese Paul Guiragossian, Syrian Marwan and Moroccan Mahi Binebine.

Photo: "Composition", Dia Azzawi, 1986. Copyrights IMA Museum.

The winning project in the competition to design the Sultanate of Oman’s pavilion at Expo Japan 2025 was announced. It was a team consisting of Bayan Musallam Al Ramadani, Ammar Abdulhameed Al Kiyoumi, and Nayera Khamis Al Hinai.

Maroun and Fouad Tomb currently display their work in the cultural space run by collector and patron Rami el-Nimer. The exhibition is curated by Randa Sadaka, who had the chance to work with the two artists in the past when she produced a monograph on Maroun Tomb.

"Maroun Tomb produces a lucid and romantic work which reflects the reality of today's Lebanese construction. Under his brush, the buildings sometimes offer a surprise or an emotion, by revealing astonishing design details or magnifying the remains". - Randa Sadaka for media L'Orient-le-Jour.

Entitled "Meshwar from Palestine to Lebanon, a dialogue between two generations Maroun and Fouad Tomb", the exhibition is organised in four parts:

• "Palestine, the beginnings" (1911-1948);
• "Lebanon, the Golden Age (1949-1981);
• "Father-Son Dialogue (1981-present)";
• "a reinterpretation by Fouad Tomb of his father's work."

"Driven by the same impressionist inspiration, the duo explores self-portrait, which is interesting knowing that years separate both artists. If Maroun's women are engaged in intellectual activity, Fouad prefers close-up portraits. Both painters share the same vision of architectural heritage, viewed as the source of authentic social ties. Maroun and Fouad's landscapes are intimately bonded to nature. - Randa Sadaka for media L'Orient-le-Jour.

Photo: exhibition view, copyright L'Orient-le-Jour.