Lebanon Pavilion

about

For the second consecutive time, Lebanon is present at La Biennale di Venezia, the most important art exhibition in the world.

The Lebanese Pavilion is a strong commitment to encourage Lebanese artists and to promote and preserve Lebanon's vibrant artistic scene on the global stage.

The participation of Lebanon at the 60th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia is under the patronage of the Lebanese Ministry of culture.

Lebanese Visual Art Association – LVAA is a non-profit association in charge of organizing the Lebanese Pavilion.

artist

curators

Mounira Al Solh

Artist Mounira Al Solh will represent Lebanon at the 60th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia.

Al Solh, is a multi-disciplinary visual artist born in 1978 in Beirut. She lives and works between Beirut and Amsterdam.

Mounira Al Solh

The Mother of David and Goliath, 2019

Oil on canvas

222×205.5cm

Courtesy of the artist and Sfeir-Semler Gallery Beirut / Hamburg

Mounira Al Solh

Aala al Bah, at the beach, 2023

Embroided beach parasol. textile. two beach chairs, sound

speaker 235 x diametre 211cm

Courtesy of the artist and Sfeir-Semler Gallery Beirut / Hamburg

Mounira Al Solh

Al Nathafa Min Al lman, 2019

Metal, wire, paper & plastic cups, light

bulbs 3m diameter

Courtesy of the artist and Sfeir-Semler Gallery Beirut / Hamburg

Al Solh, is a multi-disciplinary visual artist born in 1978 in Beirut. She lives and works between Beirut and Amsterdam.

She learned the double bass at the National Conservatory of Music in Lebanon, then graduated in Painting at the Lebanese University in Beirut (1997-2001) and Fine Arts at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam (2003-2006). She was also a research resident at Rijksakademie, Amsterdam (2007-2008). Self-reflectivity is a central strategy of her work, which explores feminist issues, tracks patterns of micro-history, bears witness to the impact of conflict, migration and displacement. Her art is socially engaged, focusing on antipatriarchal matters, the ongoing witnessing of war and trauma, language and music, historical and geographical connections and can be political and poetically escapist all at once. Al Solh strives to craft a sensory language that defies nationality and creed. In 2008, Al Solh collaboratively initiated a magazine titled NOA (Not Only Arabic), and in 2013, she co-founded NOA Language School in Amsterdam. Currently Al Solh co-initiates Modka Beiroet, where she organizes friendly and community based exhibitions and workshops in the Netherlands and in Lebanon.

Al Solh had solo exhibitions at Museumsquartier Osnabruck, Germany (2022); BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK (2022); Mori Art Museum, Tokyo (2020); Jameel Arts Centre, Dubai (2018); Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, Doha (2018); and The Art Institute Chicago (2018).

She has also participated in group exhibitions and representations including the Sharjah Biennial (2023); Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, the Netherlands (2023); Busan Biennale (2022); ROZENSTRAAT, Amsterdam (2022); Musée National de Pablo Picasso-La Guerre et la Paix, Vallauris, France (2020); Palais De de Tokyo, Paris (2020); Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven (2020); Carré d'Art Musée d'art contemporain de Nîmes (2018), Documenta14, Kassel and Athens (2017); Venice Biennale (2015); New Museum Triennial, New York (2012); Sharjah Biennial 9 (2009); 11th International Istanbul Biennial (2009), and Home Works IV, Beirut, Lebanon (2008), among others.

She is the winner of the ABN AMRO Art Award (2023), and is one of seven shortlisted artists for the Artes Mundi 10 prize (2023). Al Solh received the Uriot Prize from the Rijksakademie, Amsterdam (2007) and the Black Magic Woman Award, Amsterdam (2007). She was also shortlisted for the Abraaj Group Art Prize, Dubai (2015) and nominated for the Volkskrant Award, Amsterdam (2009).

Her video Rawane's Song won the jury prize at Videobrasil (2007).

Nada Ghandour

Commissioner & Curator

President of the Scientific Board

PHD in History of Art and expert in modern and contemporary art, Nada Ghandour is a heritage curator.

Dina Bizri

Associate Curator

Dina Bizri is an independent curator and art advisor.

Nada Ghandour

PHD in History and expert in modern and contemporary art,

Nada Ghandour is a heritage curator.

She holds four specialties:

- Masters in Museology (École du Louvre)

- Masters in History of Art (Sorbonne Paris IV)

- Masters in Preventive Conservation of Heritage (Paris 1)

- Masters in Digital Humanities (Sciences Po Paris)

She is an independent curator specializing in cultural management and digital technology.

She has worked in some of the largest European and North American museums, notably the Museum of Fine Art (Montréal), the Musée National Picasso-Paris (France) and the Fondation Louis Vuitton (Paris).

Thus, she has participated in large-scale exhibitions, such as:

Cuba: Art and History from 1868 to the present day (2008)

Picasso! The Anniversary Exhibition (2015-2016)

Icons of Modern Art. The Shtouchkine Collection (2016-2017)

She was the commissioner and curator of the Lebanese Pavilion “The World in the Image of Man” at la Biennale Arte 2022.

Dina Bizri

Dina Bizri is an independent curator and art advisor.

She has curated solo and group exhibitions in various galleries and institutions in Beirut, Paris and New York, as well as charity auctions of contemporary art.

She graduated from the Institut d'Études Supérieures des Arts - IESA Arts & Culture, Paris, and has worked at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, as well as in various contemporary art galleries, including Perrotin (Paris), CRG (New York) and Lehmann Maupin Gallery (New York).

artistic project

The Selection Committee, composed of renowned international experts chose Mounira Al Solh for “her ability to tackle poignant themes, focusing on migration and the ongoing witnessing of war and trauma with humor and a poetic approach, using a diverse range of artistic mediums: painting, drawing, embroidery, video, music, performance, and new technologies. The juxtaposition of these elements creates immersive and multisensory worlds, conveying a deep social engagement.

Her art is narrative, powerful and expressive, and brings together a diversity of materials, oral stories, forms and gestures. The questions raised by her work will significantly resonate with the issues of our time.”

The Pavilion’s scenography has been entrusted to the architect Karim Bekdache.

The Lebanese Pavilion is located in La Sala di Artillery, inside the Arsenale, one of the two main venues of La Biennale di Venezia

Karim Bekdache

Architect

Karim Bekdache, born in 1970 in Beirut, is a graduate of the École Spéciale d' Architecture in Paris. He began his career as an architect upon his return to Beirut in 1993 and founded Karim Bekdache Studio in 2000.

Karim Bekdache

Bekdache's approach centers on contextual design, where each project responds to its environment, respecting geography, nature, and history. His work favors tailor-made solutions to the application of predetermined styles. He believes that architecture should meet project

needs while also enhancing its environment.

Karim Bekdache was invited in 2016 by the Sursock Museum in Beirut to prepare for the museum's reopening in coordination with the project's architect. Working on museography, he focused on the flexibility and adaptability of the museum's space to its various future functions. He was also responsible for the design of the inaugural scenography of the museum's permanent collection, as well as the scenography of subsequent temporary exhibitions.

Bekdache's portfolio includes projects with several international artists, including Simone Fattal, Etel Adnan, Huguette Caland, and Mona Hatoum. In addition to creating exhibition scenographies for public and private institutions, Bekdache's other projects comprise the

design of theatres, dance studios, restaurants, shops, and private residential projects.

Karim Bekdache's flagship ongoing project is his work on an architectural complex honoring the legacy and work of sculptor Saloua Rouda Choucair. It consists of three units: an art foundation, an artist's residency, and a private residency. Intended to embody Choucair's passion for form, matter, and kinetics, the project integrates these three units into a pine forest in Ras el-Metn, the artist 's hometown.

about the pavilion

team

scientific board

operational team

advisors

The Scientific Board has an advisory role.

Made up of national and international specialists, its purpose is to provide recommendations and to create an environment for reflection, exchange and discussion with the artist and the architect-scenographer.

photos of the
Lebanese Pavilion
in the Venice Arsenale
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virtual tour of the
Lebanese Pavilion
in the Venice Arsenale

Nada Ghandour

Jean-François Charnier

Nathalie Bondil

Commissioner & Curator

President of the Scientific Board

General Heritage and Art Curator

@Caroline Bleux

Jean-François Charnier

Jean-François Charnier is a national general heritage and art curator.

He graduated in Art History and Archaeology from the Ecole du Louvre and in Anthropology from Université Paris X-Nanterre.

His first role was in the field of preventive archaeology and heritage coordination. He became in 2000 the director of the department in the project for the Museum of Civilizations of Europe and the Mediterranean (MUCEM). After a mission at the Ministry of Culture, he joined in 2008 Agence France-Museums to coordinate the expertise of French national museums including the Louvre, Pompidou Centre, Orsay etc. for the creation of the Louvre Abu Dhabi.

He was appointed Scientific Director of Agence France-Museums in 2013: he created the contents of the museum and led the teams responsible for the museography, art acquisitions, programming and publications of the Louvre Abu Dhabi which opened in November 2017. He then joined Afalula Agency, the body created to develop AlUla cultural destination in Saudi Arabia, in August 2018 as Scientific Director. He has proposed and developed a series of archaeological missions, a network of 8 museums called Constellation, and several initiatives in the field of art creation like art residencies, contemporary art museum and several art commissions. All of these programs are currently in development.

Nathalie Bondil

Nathalie Bondil is a French and Canadian museologist and art historian. Specializing in 19th-century to modern art, as well as in sculpture, she has overseen a number of architectural expansion projects and redevelopments of encyclopedic collections.

She has an expertise in intercultural relations and in educational, inclusive and social initiatives, particularly in museotherapy. As a curator, she has developed international multidisciplinary exhibitions encompassing visual art, cinema, music, couture...

France's national heritage curator, Nathalie Bondil served as director and chief curator of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts from 2007 to 2020, becoming the first woman to lead the institution.

Between 2013 and 2021, she also held the position of Vice President of the Canada Council for the Arts. Since 2021, she is the Museum and Exhibitions Director at the Arab World Institute (IMA), France.

Co-curator of Lights from Lebanon (2021) and Arab Modernities (2022), she oversees the future New IMA Museum. A member of the board of ICOM-France, she has received several awards and distinctions.

Museum and Exhibitions Director,

Institute for the Arab World, IMA, France

team

operational team

Nada Ghandour

Charles Simon Thomas

Cherine Soubra Assouad

Ibrahim Kombarji

Dina Bizri

Lara Nader Mouawad

Nadine Katabi

Nada Ghandour

Commissioner and Curator

Legal and Fiscal

Public Relations

Head of Fundraising Lebanon and Europe

Associate Curator

Head of Fundraising USA

Graphic Designer and Editorial Manager

Head of Fundraising Gulf Region

Communication & Event Coordinator

Dina Bizri

Dina Bizri is an independent curator and art advisor.

She has curated solo and group exhibitions in various galleries and institutions in Beirut, Paris and New York, as well as charity auctions of contemporary art.

She graduated from the Institut d'Études Supérieures des Arts - IESA Arts & Culture, Paris, and has worked at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, as well as in various contemporary art galleries, including Perrotin (Paris), CRG (New York) and Lehmann Maupin Gallery (New York).

Charles Simon Thomas

Charles Simon Thomas initially trained as a lawyer, he began his career in a real estate IT firm and moved on to financial markets software within 3V Finance, a subsidiary of the Viel Group. From there, he progressed as a search consultant with Norman Parsons / Robert Half where he became a partner. He later set up his own firm for legal and financial search, starting in the Netherlands, then in France.

He cofounded LIFE France in 2009 where he was first President and then Treasurer until 2020. He is also a co-founder of the IC Fondation (International College) France.

Lara Nader Mouawad

Lara Nader Mouawad is a visual artist, a painter and a freelance graphic designer. She lives in Dubai and has a diploma in Graphic Arts from the Académie Libanaise des Beaux-Arts (ALBA) in Beirut.

She starts her career as an Art Director in a multinational company before setting up on her own, working on cultural events and art projects.

She is the founder of "Lenabni", a sustainable platform whose mission is to support and promote the handicrafts of several Lebanese artisans and NGOs based in Lebanon.

Cherine Soubra Assouad

Cherine Soubra Assouad holds a Master degree in business Marketing and Management from Beirut University College (BUC).

She held positions both in public and private sector organizations.

Starting off her career at the Daily Star as a manager of the advertising department before joining the Swiss Embassy in Beirut as a Press Officer than became the 1st secretary. She established in France and She is the Author of « les Aventures de Titolo » a children book.

She has been organizing several charity events for the benefit of the underprivileged.

Nadine Katabi

Nadine graduated with a Masters in Communications and Marketing from ISCOM Paris in 2009. She then joined BBDO Paris as an Account Executive where she helped develop and deploy 360 campaigns in over 60 countries.

She participated in the launch of products as well as in the creation of the brand identity and positioning. She lives now in Beirut where she handles brand strategy, communication, events and deployment for Lebanese brands.

Ibrahim Kombarji

Ibrahim Kombarji is an architect, researcher and writer currently based in Milan, Italy, where he leads major exhibition design and research projects. He also previously collaborated with offices in New York, Paris, and Beirut. Ibrahim's work explores the entanglements between design, ecology, and geopolitics.

He is a graduate of the American University of Beirut and Columbia University's GSAPP where he was granted the school's Incubator Prize 2023. Ibrahim has also just recently been a leading tutor as part of the Architecture Association's summer program 'Materiality of Art Basel Fair'. His most recent writings have been published in Humboldt Books, Bartlett's Prospective Journal, It's Freezing in LA! Magazine and Yale Paprika.

Scenography & Exhibition Designer Coordinator

team

advisors

Dania Haffar Bazzy

Charbel Abou Charaf

Nicole Araygi

Consultant Media & Communication

Legal Advisor (International)

Legal Advisor (Lebanon)

Dania Haffar Bazzy

Dania Haffar Bazzy is the Founder and Managing Director of Visionbuz, a brand, marketing, and communications consultancy providing strategic advice and integrated solutions to organizations and individuals on building brands, creating competitive market positions, and developing differentiated marketing, and communication strategies across multiple business lines.

Dania is a seasoned professional with a 20-year track record working in and with global multi-national institutions, across multiple jurisdictions and business lines.

Charbel Abou Charaf

Charbel Abou Charaf is a partner at the international law firm White & Case. Having started his career with White & Case in New York, he is now based between London and the Middle East. Charbel specializes in mergers and acquisitions,

restructuring and financial markets, representing governments, sovereign wealth funds, large conglomerates and private clients in their operations around the world.

Charbel is also in charge of the firm's pro bono initiative for the MENA region, working with a large number of NGOs and individuals on many issues relating to human rights, microfinance, education, culture and the arts.

Nicole Araygi

Nicole Araygi is a lawyer working in the international law field. She graduated from Saint Joseph University in 2014 and has been a member of the Beirut Bar since 2015.

She is currently an associate at Araygi & Maalouly Law Firm and teaches a workshop in private international law at the Saint Joseph University. Before joining Araygi & Maalouly, Nicole worked in international law firms in Paris and is still regularly collaborating with these international firms.

Nicole’s areas of expertise include international arbitration, private international law, commercial law and litigation before Lebanese courts.

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