JOANNA RAAD

Born in Chebanieh, Lebanon; Joanna Raad is a Lebanese multidisciplinary artist and researcher. As a professional set designer/art director, she worked on several renowned TV programs and series, TV commercials, music videos, short feature films and theatre plays. Joanna started to draw at a very young age. Her passion for drawing became progressively professional. She took extra-curricular painting classes with Odile Mazloum, Haidar Hammawi, Fouad Tomb, Jean-Paul, and Emmanuel Guiragossian. Reconstruction of the past and compiling archives accompanied her artistic research.  Drawing is more her passion than painting. For the artist, there is freedom in drawing, as she can quickly express herself within the intimacy of a bedroom, in a coffee shop, or even on a plane. She considers drawing on paper an intimate gesture, almost like writing a diary.  Raad paints her story in a naive/neo-expressionist style. It all started with obsessive flashbacks doodled on recycled paper with oil pastels. Photography was rare in the 70ies in Beirut. This triggered the artist to reconstitute her past from her ‘emotional memory. The representations of the ‘scenes’ from the past include a theatrical and cinematographic feel: Close-ups,” large shots”, ‘College Protestant Francais’, ‘the house of Teta Marie’, ‘house of tante Georgette’ etc. Joanna Raad is also a lecturer at the faculty of arts and art history at AUB and part-time at USEK, department of performing arts. She has a Ph.D. in Theater, a Master’s in Cinema, and a BA in performing art from the Saint-Joseph University in Beirut (USJ/IESAV). She is also a researcher on the History of modern art and the correspondence between arts. 

KEY EXHIBITIONS

Spring 2022,  ‘Onwards’. Bloom Gallery, Valencia, Spain

Spring 2022, “Hunna”, ABC Verdun art space, Beirut, Lebanon

23 September – 09 October 2021, ‘Once upon a time in west Beirut’, solo exhibition, Zico House, Beirut

June 2021, Artists of Beirut Collective Pop up Show Season Two, ‘Women of Beirut: Untold stories’, Bossa Nova Hotel, Beirut, Lebanon

2015, Musée Emmanuel Guiragossian, Beirut

2013,  Intallation:’Hommage à mon Pere’, Université Saint Joseph, Beirut

2010, ‘Gebran visits Beyrouth’, Laboratoire d’art

2007, ‘Time Laps’, Solo Exhibition,  Art Lounge, Lebanon

2003 – 2005,  Permanent Group exhibition at ‘espace ADG’ , Gemmayzeh, lebanon

SELECTED ARTWORKS