CHARBEL SAMUEL AOUNMULTIDISCIPLINARY ARTIST

Born in 1980, Charbel Samuel Aoun holds a master's degree in architecture(2004).During the following five years he worked as a conceptual designer in severalarchitectural firms in Beirut and explored the fields of audiovisual and theatre.At the same time, he started creating a wild garden, combining hundreds ofvarieties of plants and trees.

Relation with nature and the architectural experience pushed the artist towardworking with a variety of mediums such as wood sticks, manure, dust, anddiscarded objects.

Lebanon is very diverse culturally within the spatial dimension and emotionallythrough time. In each period social images tends to be both poetic andcatastrophic.That diversity resonates in the artist work through a variety of mediums fromdaily life uncovering emotions of the present as a trace of time and culture.

Several collectors and institutions such as the Royal Family of Emirates,Raymond Audi, Jean Marc Decrop, Abraham Karabajakian, and the TateModern museum collected the artist's work.He is currently represented by Mark Hachem Gallery (Beirut-Paris-New York).

CHARBEL SAMUEL AOUNMULTIDISCIPLINARY ARTIST

WORKS2006 - 2014

Out of Space2006-2007

In 2006, Israel bombed Lebanon. ManyLebanese wanted to flee but most of themwere unable to do so due to Visa issues. Thishighlighted the struggling human beings intheir own spaces towards brutal happeningsand more structured laws.The work presented an assemblage of well-structured orthogonal spaces in whichorganic human like tortured creatures tried toget out. They were sculpted with fire (meltedplastic) to express the suffering and death thatwere taking place, the color ended black dueto the process.The spaces were created starting with adrawing software as AutoCAD then executedusing Plexiglas and a laser cut machine inorder to emphasize our modern societies inwhich human beings must be structured.The works were exhibited in the Frenchcultural center in 2007.

Untitled70x160x60cm2006

Out of Space

Untitled80x130x30 cm2006

Out of Space

Untitled50x50x50 cm2007

Out of Space

Untitled80x50x20 cm2006

Out of Space

Beirut Mix2009

In 2009, manybuilding sites werenewly put up inBeirut. Capitalismwas at its peak. As isreaction to that, aseries of paintingswere made about thedifferences betweenthe social classes ofBeirut.

The artist alsocreated a stop motiondepicting the socialclasses' struggle,throughoutinstallations inmovement using oldand new shoes.

Beirut Mix

Concrete InvasionPaint on Canvas120x60cm2009

Carnivor ArchitecturePaint on Canvas120x60cm2009

Beirut Mix

UndergroundPaint on Canvas120x60cm2009

Night-LifePaint on Canvas120x60cm2009

Beirut Mix

Social ClassStop Motion2009

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ohgqitzhfumsz0y/WE0xwBvZIx#lh:null-social%20class.movWatch Video

Pulse2011

Right before the!Arab Springs", andafter visiting Egyptand Syria, a series ofpaintings was createdin order to reflectthe poverty and thesocial tensions of themass population. Aflow of people wereinvading the space ofthe canvas, all withan expression ofmisery and a desireof change.This collection wasexhibited at ArtspaceGallery-Dubaibeginning 2011.

Pulse

Fragmented SocietyPaint on Canvas185x185cm2010

Pulse

Fragmented SocietyPaint on Canvas185x185cm2010

Pulse

TranscendancePaint on Canvas185x185cm2010

Pulse

Supper of PovertyPaint on Canvas135x200cm2010

Pulse

Le SouciPaint on Canvas120x120cm2010

Pulse

Dregs of HumanityPaint on Canvas135x200cm2010

Lost Spring2012

While the international mediawas still talking about Arabsprings and people were goingto more radicalism, the artistwanted to invite them towardsanother reality, that of nature, a!Lost Spring".Using natural medium such ascotton and wood sticks mixedwith colors, the artist createdatmospheres exploring thehuman emotions throughnature: death, hope, survival,depression#The work stands as a mirror ofthe society expressed in adifferent reality, one that hasalways been present in the aside.This collection was exhibited atSmoGallery-Beirut -2012.

Lost Spring

Oreganum SyriacumMixed Media on Canvas150x150cm2012

Lost Spring

Blue TripMixed Media on Canvas200x200cm2012

Lost Spring

The WindMixed Media on Canvas150x150cm2012

Lost Spring

Imprint of TimeMixed Media on Canvas200x300cm2012

Lost Spring

RebirthNatural Wooden Sticks280x280x200cm2012

104532012

10453 is a play about life in1km2 of trash. It refers to theactual size ofLebanon (10,452 km2 +1 km2).The show was meant to beperformed in the streets and isessentially very visual, focusing ondaily behaviours and poeticscenes.Charbel Samuel Aoun made thescenography and presented someimages in collaboration withwriter and director CamilleBrunel.The set was entirely made ofdiscarded objects and materials.10453 is a BIM Projectproduction and was toured on theSeaside of Tyr, Saida and Beirut(Lebanon) in 2012.

10453

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGkQTe3MQ-AWatch Video

10453

10453 Final Scene

Anti Carnivor2012

As a reaction to anorder placed by adesigner for a burgerrestaurant in Beirut,who planned to hanga cow's head as part ofthe interior design,the artist wanted tobring the whole cowalong with itsatmosphere and itscontextual material:he chose the cowmanure as a statementagainst the image ofcow as part of a diet.The work was refusedand the artist kept thework.

Anti Carnivor

Cow Manure120x60x60cm2012

Friendly Gas2013

Friendly gas was meant to beexhibited in Qatar at the Tasmeemdesign art fair-2013 (made inQatar).The artist decided to question therelation people have with gas, andtherefore they were invited to smellit; an experience that produced fearand hesitation in societies where gasplays a crucial role in their economy.However, once they did smell, theydiscovered the scent of oud (oldQatary perfume). Its presence wasmeant to question the relationbetween the senses and also tocontrast experiences from the pastand the present in one singlemoment.The installation was produced byAnima Gallery-Doha.

Friendly Gas

Garbagescape2013

Garbagescape contrasts the modern humanintervention with the pure state of Nature.It points out the transformation of our landscapes dueto our behaviour and reactions towards natural spaces.Shoes collected from the garbage mountain of Saidawere used as a medium to gradually invade dead sticks'structures on 3 phases, then exhibited in glass boxes.Under these boxes one hundred plant of oreganumsyriacum (aromatic native plant known as zaatar) wereplaced and contrasted with the visual of garbage(shoes).Inside the middle box, two microphones were installedand they were connected to headphones. When theviewer put them, he discovers a track contrasting bothsounds of nature and human interventions in the city(All sounds were registered In Lebanon).The artist wanted to make from the contrast betweenhuman actions and nature a multisensory experience forthe viewer.Garbagescape was exhibited at Beirut Art Fair-2013.

Garbagescape

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDstOjToKmIWatch Video

Voice of the Invisibles2013

Twelve analog phones were hanged on a wall.The phones were connected with a telephone exchanger linked toa computer with a software that triggers the calls. The softwarewas able to manage 4 calls simultaneously.During the time of the installation, the phones ring, thespectator picks up...then he's suddenly immersed in the voice ofa person who is telling his story and testifying about moments inhis life.Amal, Fayçal, Caroline, Wadih, Khaled, Élies, Hana, Lina, Marie,Michel, Muhamad and Yussef are aged between 13 and 75. Mostof them are Syrians or Lebanese from Syrian origins, and theyallow us to listen to their stories. A family life, a love story, apresent reality, a sad statement, a testimony; each of them haslived a drama, a tragedy. Each of them carries a scar, alive orasleep, connected to the reality of this region. These peopletestify about a reality they are no longer in controle...!Voice of the Invisibles"was exhibited at Mediterranea 16-YoungMediterranean Artists Biennial.Artistic collaboration: Camille BrunelSoftware Design: Dr.Chafik Mokbel

Voice of the Invisibles

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ixv7iHHk1M4Watch Video

From the Dust2013

!From the Dust"is a collectionof paintings made entirely of thedust collected in the streets ofBeirut.Ever since the war began inSyria, Lebanon has been quiteaffected. The conflict spread,and more than a million Syrianrefugees, many families,children, and lonely men, arenow invading the public gardensand staying in the streets ofBeirut.It is the dusty world of thepeople, the fear, the loss and thedestruction, that the artistexpresses.He invites the viewer to enterthe world of those refugees for abetter understanding of War.

From the Dust

Everything LostDust on Koran Papers200x100cm2013

The Last MomentDust on Canvas200x100cm2013

From the Dust

Le PenseurDust on Koran Papers130x90cm2013

From the Dust

Social MiseryDust on Canvas100x200cm2013

From the Dust

On The Public BenchDust on Koran Papers100x200cm2013

You maybe Next2014

With the rise of terrorism in the Middle East (Iraq$Syria- Lebanon), lot ofexplosions and terrorist attacks happened recently mainly in public places. Anyidentified parked car scared people as they became very cautious from potentialbombs.The installation is about sharing that fear. Using objects from daily life- objectspeople recognize-the artist recreate the experience of taking the risk.A gas bottle is hanged from the ceiling oppositely above a fire stove. It gives theimpression of a potential explosion leaving the viewer between looking at theexhibited object and running away from it.That fear reintroduces the present social feeling of every person risking his lifeon the streets to survive.P.s: after doing many tests and trials in a gas factory, physically there's no riskon the viewer. Still it generates that feeling as an experience.Technical description:A gas bottle is hanged from ceiling with 4 thin metallic cables, around the gasbottle is attached 3 metallic strips that goes down to hold a gas stove.The gas bottle is connected to the stove with a copper pipe that goes inside thebottle to reach the highest point avoiding being filled by gas liquid. Thedistance between the stove and the bottle is fixed on 40cm in relation to amaximum temperature of 60 degrees.

You maybe Next

You maybe NextInstallation - 2014work in progress

Solo Exhibitions:

2012 Lost Spring $ Smo Gallery-Beirut2011 Pulse - Art Space Gallery, Dubai2010 Flows $Art Lounge, Beirut2009 Beirut Mix $Zico House, Hamra2007 Out of Space $ French Cultural Center-Beirut2005 Demonstrations $ADG Art Center - Beirut

Collective Exhibitions:

2013 Beirut Artfair- Garbagescape -Biel, Beirut2013 ! jeux de la francophonie-Nice"- representing Lebanon in painting-

Special mention of the jury2013 Biennale of Mediterranean artists-Voice OfThe Invisibles-Ancone, Italy.2013 Residency in Caos museum-Terni-Italy2013 « twelve »-Mark Hachem artgallery-Beirut2013Tasmeem Doha design fair-Friendly Gas2012 Set design!10453-a story about life in 1km2 of trash"2012 Beirut Artfair- Biel, Beirut2012 Salon d'Automne $Beirut Exhibition Center-organized by Sursock Museum2012 Ipanam-villa Zein, Beirut Downtown-organized by Hamazkayin Art gallery2012 Pied D'oeuvres $ Smogallery, Karantina-Beirut2011 Art Expo, Istanbul2010 Lebanese Art Diaspora $Beirut Dome, Beirut Downtown

Tribute to the Martyrs $Hamazkayin Art GalleryTear down the Walls $Art Space Gallery, Dubai

2009 Salon d'Automne $ Sursock MuseumRaja Nehme Sertin Art GalleryCulture and Identity $Haigazian University

2006 La Peinture des Architectes $Paul Guiragossian Museum2004 Lebanese YoungTalents Exhibition organized by the European Union.