Etel Adnan

Born Beirut, Lebanon, 1925

Adnan is a writer and a painter. She studied philosophy at the Sorbonne, Paris, and at the University of California and Harvard University, USA. She taught the philosophy of art at the Dominican College of San Rafael, California for several years and has lectured at various universities. She is the author of several books of poetry and fiction, including a novel about the Lebanese civil war, Sitt Marie Rose, 1977. In the 1960s she combined her skills as a writer and a painter to create her first livre d’artiste. She has continued to explore the relationship between word and image and has created over two hundred ‘artist’s books’. Inspired first and foremost by Arabic poetry, she also gains inspiration from French and American authors. Her work includes paintings, drawings, ceramics and tapestries. She has exhibited extensively in Europe, the Middle East and the United States.Adnan lives in Sausalito (California), Paris and Beirut.