Launch of a Permanent Art Exhibition
Sheikh Zayed Exhibition Hall - Safadi Fine Arts Building - LAU Beirut Campus
The School of Arts and Sciences is pleased to launch a permanent art exhibition at Sheikh Zayed Hall. The opening show, themed around “the body,” will feature paintings by artists Zeina Nader and Wissam Melhem as well as a digital exhibit of music and paintings by Nader.
The exhibition is open to the public through November 1.
About the Artists
Zeina Nader
After graduating from Université Saint-Joseph, Beirut, with a communication arts degree in 1996, Zeina Nader chose to follow her passion for painting. What started out as a hobby, using all kinds of materials (porcelain, wood, leather, fabric, etc) slowly became a professional career of painting on canvas by way of her familiarity with oil, acrylic, charcoal, watercolors and other mixed media. The Lebanese artist’s main inspirations were impressionist and figurative artists. She found her path in abstract painting, which she says has “many beautiful tales to tell and infinite vibrations to create.” Abstraction is for her a source of pure delight.
She has exhibited in New York, Montreal, Paris, London, Madrid, Milan, Monaco, Copenhagen, Bruges, and more. She has also published Mots Sur Couleurs (2016); Non, je ne suis pas une blogueuse (2018); and a book about her art travels in Italy (2021).
Wissam Melhem
Wissam Melhem is a Lebanese painter and sculptor — in his own words, “an architect, landscape designer, and artist, currently exploring different contemporary themes through the processes of sketching and painting.” The hallmark of his art is the representation of five main elements: the human, the city, the crown, the bird and the cloud. To him, “art is a fantasy, a poetic consilience, a possibility of realizing an utopian vision for the coming future.”His most recent solo and collective shows have taken him to Budapest, Milan, Fuerteventura (Spain), Istanbul, and Peoria (Illinois, USA), in addition to various exhibits in Lebanon. Melhem’s unique work led to him being selected as a featured artist at the Peoria Riverfront Museum from November 30, 2021 to January 9, 2022, with one of his artworks officially accepted into the museum’s permanent collection.
Melhem holds a BA in Archictecture and an MA in Landscape Urbanism. He has worked for over 15 years as senior architect at Nadim Karam and Hapsitus Architects in Beirut and teaches at the American University of Beirut.