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Tongue-tied
The Evasiveness of Language in Today’s Arab Comics
Edited by Hatem El Imam (Samandal Comics www.samandal.org)
Hatem El Imam
Hatem El Imam studied Graphic Design in the American University of Beirut, and graduated with a BA in summer 2000. After working as a web designer and an art director for two years he decided to open his own design studio. He has worked in theatre, event organization, and has art directed the short film Both. In 2005, he decided to pursue an MA degree in Fine Art in the University College for the Creative Arts from which he graduated in September 2006 with distinction. He has co-founded Samandal comics magazine, exhibited work in Lebanon, England, and New York and currently teaches design at the American University of Beirut.
Contributors:
Vartan Avakian
Born in Beirut in 1977, and raised in the port town of Jbeil. Vartan Avakian sprung from his father's mechanics shop to the Lebanese American University as a junior in Industrial engineering, to finally major in Communication Arts. He has since been working as a video editor and designer for the stage. His work features hybrid machines and installations in various media.
Mohieddin Ellabbad
Mohieddin Ellabbad was born in Cairo, Egypt, where he studied painting at the Academy of Fine Arts. Before completing his degree he began work as a caricaturist for Roz al-youssef and Sabah al-khayr weeklies. He also wrote and illustrated his first book for children, published in 1961. In 1974, he co-founded the first Palestinian children’s book publisher, Dar Al Fata Al Arabi. He has also worked as art director, author, illustrator and designer for many other publishing companies as well as for newspapers and magazines in Egypt and other Arabic-speaking countries. Mohieddin’s books have received numerous prizes, including three prizes for the best children’s book in Arabic from the Beirut Book Fair and a silver medal from the Leipzig International Book Fair. The Illustrator’s Notebook won the prestigious Golden Apple award at the Biennial of illustration in Bratislava, the Octogone de Chêne from the Centre International d’Études en Littérature de Jeunesse in France, and the Bern Blaue Brillenschlange award. Mohieddin Ellabbad lives in Cairo, Egypt.
Mazen Kerbaj
Mazen Kerbaj was born in Beirut in 1975 and has lived there since. His main passions are comics, painting, and music. In March 2000, he published some of his more personal works in his Journal 1999 (a dairy in comics). He has published eight other books and many short stories. Also in 2000, he performed in his first concert, at the Strike's pub in Beirut. This concert, a duo with Lebanese sax player Christine Sehnaoui, was probably the first improv music concert in the Middle East. In 2007, l'Association published his book Beyrouth, juillet-aout 2006. (www.kerbaj.com)
Omar Khouri
Omar Khouri was born in London, England, in 1978, but grew up in Lebanon. He studied illustration in Massachusetts College of Art in Boston. After acquiring a Bachelor of Fine Art, he moved to Los Angeles for a year, and worked as a storyboard artist for various projects including The Final Cut, a feature length film by Omar Naim, starring Robin Williams. In 2003, He returned to Beirut where he has since worked on a variety of projects that span many mediums and art forms, including print, theatre, film, and music. He has also had three exhibitions of his paintings in Beirut, as well as two in New York. Despite the wide variety of application, his work is always grounded in the pursuit of the Portrait through the manipulation of the nuances and subtleties of Time in sequential imagery. Recently, Omar has come back to comics, the medium that first sparked his artistic curiosity over fifteen years ago. His latest projects include Salon Tarek il Khurafi, a serialized comic that features regularly in Samandal comics magazine, of which he is a co-founder.
Maha Maamoun
Maha Maamoun is a visual artist based in Cairo. Her exhibitions include: Global Cities – Tate Modern, C on Cities – 10th Venice Biennale of Architecture, 2006; Snap Judgments – ICP, NY, 2006; Biennial of Contemporary African art DAK’ART, Dakar, 2004; 5th Biennale of African photography, Bamako, 2003. She was co-curator of PhotoCairo3 - an international Photography and Video event based in Cairo, 2005, and assistant curator for Meeting Points 5 – a Multidisciplinary Contemporary Arts Festival happening in 9 cities of the Arab world (2007). Maamoun is one of the members of the Contemporary Image Collective (CiC) - a Cairo-based artist-collective.
Omar Naim
Omar Naim wrote and directed The Final Cut, starring Robin Williams. It premiered in competition at the Berlin Film Festival and won the Best Screenplay award at the Deauville Film Festival. He is a contributor to the Samandal Comics Magazine.
email: zoefilm@hotmail.com
John Nasr
John Nasr was born in California not so long ago. He is a Japanese cultural enthusiast, bass player, and dormant political scholar living in Beirut, where he makes hip-hop music and helps with his Ma’s family business.
Barrack Rima
Barrack Rima est né en 1972 à El-Mina au Liban et vit en Belgique depuis 1991. Après des études à l’Académie des Beaux-Arts de Bruxelles (illustration et BD) et l’Institut des Arts de diffusion (réalisation film, radio, TV), il publie deux albums de BD “Beyrouth” (1995), et “Le Conteur du Caire” (1998). Il tourne Souvenir de Beyrouth, son film de fin d’études, en 1999, puis un documentaire, La Terre de 48 (2003).
The fdz
Hatched in a roostery somewhere in Beirut, the fdz led a mysterious childhood rife with comics, telly and Nutella until he emerged from the American University of Beirut a fully-functioning graphic designer/illustrator/animator/procrastinator. He battled the forces of freelance work in Beirut until his victory in 2004, when he announced that “his work here was done” and decided to seek worthier adversaries abroad. Armed with a scholarship from the KRSF, he studied with the yogis of England and attained mastery over the art of filmmaking. He currently resides on the peripheries of adventure, choosing a life of solitude and meditation as he readies himself for the unleashing of his filmic assault upon the public. The fdz is a co-founder of Samandal comics magazine. email: thefdz@yahoo.com
Raed Yassin
Raed Yassin was born in Beirut 1979, a video, sound and visual artist, also works as a musician (double bass, tapes and electronics). Graduated from the theatre department in the Fine Arts Institute in Beirut. His work is based on themes related to the media, the city, the history of contemporary art, Arab cinema, disasters, and archives. Currently he lives and works in Amsterdam. His videos include ,Beirut (2003), Antenna Sonata (2003), Featuring Hind Rostom (2005), Untitled, Till Now (2006), and Tonight (2007). |
