The American University of Beirut is a private, non-sectarian, and independent university chartered in New York with its campus in Beirut, Lebanon. AUB is governed by a private, autonomous board of trustees and offers programs leading to bachelor's, master's, MD, and PhD degrees.
Elaine Marie Catherine de Kooning was an Abstract Expressionist and Figurative Expressionist painter in the post-World War II era. She wrote extensively on the art of the period and was an editorial associate for Art News magazine.
Ghada Amer is a contemporary artist, much of her work deals with issues of gender and sexuality. Her most notable body of work involves highly layered embroidered paintings of women's bodies referencing pornographic imagery.
Etel Adnan was a Lebanese-American poet, essayist, and visual artist. In 2003, Adnan was named "arguably the most celebrated and accomplished Arab American author writing today" by the academic journal MELUS: Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States.
Huguette Caland was a Lebanese painter, sculptor and fashion designer known for her erotic abstract paintings and body landscapes. Based out of Los Angeles, her art was displayed in numerous exhibitions and museums around the world.
Saloua Raouda Choucair was a Lebanese painter and sculptor.
Jumana El-Husseini, was a Palestinian painter and sculptor born in Jerusalem, who later lived in Paris. She won many medals and has an extensive international exhibition record. Jumana El-Husseini died in her home in Paris on 11 April 2018 at the age of 86.
Rania Stephan is a Lebanese filmmaker and video artist. She is best known for her first feature film The Three Disappearances of Soad Hosni (2011).
Helen Katharine Forbes was a Californian artist and arts educator specializing in etching, murals and painting. She is best known for western landscapes, portrait paintings, and her murals with the Treasury Section of Fine Arts and Work Progress Administration (WPA). Forbes was skilled in painting in oil, watercolor, and egg tempera. She painted landscapes of Mexico, Mono Lake and the Sierras in the 1920s, desert scenes of Death Valley in the 1930s, and portraits and still-lifes.
Bahia Shehab is an Egyptian multidisciplinary artist, designer, historian, creative director, educator and activist based in Cairo. Her work is concerned with identity and cultural heritage, and uses Islamic art history and in particular Islamic calligraphy and graphic design to explore contemporary Arab politics, feminist discourse and social issues.
Farah ALHashim is a Kuwaiti-Lebanese filmmaker and journalist based in Paris. ALHashim has been making films since 2011 including 7 Hours, which won several awards at film festivals in 2013 and Breakfast in Beirut in 2015, which was honored at multiple festivals.
Mahbas (Solitaire) is a Lebanese romantic, comedy movie directed by Sophie Boutros and produced by Nadia Eliewat; Both Boutros and Eliewat are the film writers. The film premiered in the Dubai International Film Festival in 2016 and released in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, UAE, Kuwait, and Palestine in 2017. The film revolves around the story of a Lebanese mother who has developed a deep hatred towards Syrians as she lost her brother to a tragic incident during the Lebanese-Syrian war. The memory of her brother's death still fresh, keeps her hatred ongoing to the point that when she finds out that her daughter's suitor and his family are Syrians, she is determined to stop the engagement. The film has a message of tolerance and forgiveness explicit in the two families comedic roller coaster ups and downs that eventually unravels the hatred in the end. Although the film targets the Lebanese and the Syrians, its message is applicable to other Arab neighbors and in general too.
Najat Aoun Saliba is a Professor of Analytical Chemistry and an atmospheric chemist at the American University of Beirut (AUB). She was the Director of AUB's Nature Conservation Center from 2013 till 2020. Saliba is also the co-founder and director of Khaddit Beirut and the founder and director of the Environment Academy. She was appointed a laureate of the L'Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science program in 2019. In 2022 she was elected to the Lebanese parliament.
Lina Khoury, born April 27, 1976, is a Lebanese theatre director, writer, producer, and educator. She is known for tackling taboo subjects and raising controversial questions in her plays.
Nada Sehnaoui is a visual artist and political activist. Her artworks, spanning painting, mixed media works, sculpture and installations, have been widely exhibited internationally, and have been featured in the press and print publications worldwide.
Fadia Ahmad is a Spanish-Lebanese photographer, artist, and filmmaker.
Elham Kallab is a Lebanese academic and researcher born in 1944. She is president of the Graduate Women International, member of the National Commission for Lebanese Women and the Chairperson of the Youth and Education Committee. She is also a professor of East-West Relations at the Institute of Muslim-Christian Studies at Saint Joseph University. She was awarded the National Order of the Cedar medal with the Rank of Knight.
Aya Mouallem, born on January 17, 1998, is a Lebanese electrical engineer, gender equality activist, and a Knight-Hennessy Scholar at Stanford University. She is the co-founder, co-director, and current board advisory member of All Girls Code, a volunteer-led initiative to provide Lebanese female youth with coding experience. Mouallem is active in the field of Arab youth women empowerment in STEM.
Mounira Al Solh is a Lebanese-Dutch visual artist. She is represented by Sfeir-Semler Gallery.
Jala Makhzoumi is an Iraqi prominent figure in the field of landscape architecture, currently serving as an adjunct professor at the American University of Beirut. Her extensive research encompasses a variety of subjects within landscape design, including sustainable urban greening and postwar recovery strategies. Makhzoumi has made significant contributions to the academic and practical aspects of landscape architecture, evident through her co-authorship of influential books such as Ecological Landscape Design and Planning: The Mediterranean Context and The Right to Landscape. In 2023, she became the first architect from the Middle East to be elected Vice President of the International Federation of Landscape Architects, further solidifying her position as a leading voice in the field. Additionally, she holds the role of the Middle East Chapter President of the IFLA. Makhzoumi's commitment to landscape architecture is also reflected in her co-founding of UNIT44, a Lebanon-based design and planning practice that specializes in landscape and urban design, as well as landscape architecture.
