I am a Lebanese painter and printmaker. I currently live and work in the city of Ghent in Belgium.

The human figure occupies a central place in my artistic production. Many of my portraits - including many group portraits - depict ordinary people, often strangers, seen in the street, sometimes vagabonds or street vendors.

Recently, I have taken a new turn as a portraitist in the more or less traditional sense of the term, whilst taking painstaking care of realism and pushing it to new personal boundaries.

My production is divided between painting, mainly in oil, and engraving, notably etching, burin and mezzotint.

For a little history...

My career began at the end of the 1990s, following my diploma in Visual Arts. Local successes and awards followed, as well as official representation of my country. At that time, although I was equally involved in painting, drawing and engraving, I was especially known for engraving. And it was as a printmaker that I earned my living. Teaching also began to take part of my activity.

Then, it was the call for immigration... So many things seemed to be missing in my dear Levant: museums, great schools, fairs and galleries...

Canada, Europe, then back to Lebanon. Then again to Canada and now back to Europe.

Regarding the site…

Rather than being a catalog raisonné, these web pages have been designed to serve as a virtual gallery, aiming to show my most recent artistic production and, where appropriate, to link it to my prior work, for those interested to get a better idea of ​​the evolution and origins of my current work.

In order to avoid the maze of categorizing and sub-categorizing, navigation through the works will be largely based on the notion of themes rather than technique. Thus, taking the example of the most current series: "Itinérance (2021)" - which can be consulted on the Works page, the title was increased by a date (in parentheses), to distinguish it from two other series of the same inspiration, undertaken in 1998 and resumed in 2014. In addition, simple technical information has been added to it, namely [painting] or [engraving] (in square brackets).

The specific techniques of these works are indicated in the captions placed at the bottom of the thumbnails, in the pages of the categories themselves.

More recent works will be added over time.

Thank you for your interest!

Khalil

February 2024