Mona Nahleh completed her English Literature degree from the Lebanese University in Beirut / Since, Mona has taken to her canvas to document her story / Each brushstroke a word and each divine figure a poem / Mona has formed a very unique style as well as subject matter to her art / The viewer is often invited to be taken away into a distant reality, a utopia that Mona continuously explores through each canvas, each story / Mona has held a plethora of solo shows across the Middle East’s esteemed galleries / Upcoming solo exhibitions in Amman and Dubai /

Education

English Literature, Lebanese University, Lebanon
Academic painting techniques with Egyptian Artist “Mansour Ahamed”, Cairo, Egypt

Solo Exhibitions

2014 “Temporal Totems” Art On 56th gallery, Beirut, Lebanon
2010 Boushahri Art Gallery, Kuwait
2010 “Walls”, Connaissances des Arts Gallery, Saifi Vilage, Downtown, Beirut, Lebanon
2008 “Mirrors”, Safana Art Gallery, Beirut, Lebanon
2007 “Seekers” Al Bareh Art gallery, Bahrain
2006 “Defying Morpheus” Safana Art Gallery, Beirut, Lebanon
2005 “People- Abstracted”, Al Sayed Art Gallery, Damascus, Syria
2004 “From and Formlessness”, Espace SD, Ashrafieh, Beirut, Lebanon
2003 Phoenicia Hotel, with Chahine Gallery, Beirut, Lebanon
2003 “Birth of Passion” Chahine Gallery, Beirut, Lebanon
2002 “Silent Echoes”, Beirut Association for Social Development Beirut, Lebanon
2000 City Café, Beirut, Lebanon
2000 “Retrospective”, Holiday Inn Martinez, Ain El Mrayseh, Beirut, Lebanon
1994 Al Shomoa Art Gallery, Maadi, Egypt

Group Exhibitions

2015 London Global Art Fair, Olympia Art15, London, UK
2015 Al Asmakh International Art Sympisium, Doha, Qatar
2014 Beirut Art Fair with gallery Art On 56th, Beirut, Lebanon
2007 Salon D’Automne Musee Sursock, Beirut, Lebanon

Memberships

Member of the Lebanese Association of Painting and Sculpture
Member of The International Artist Association

Private Collections

Permanent exhibition, Quana, Lebanon
“Chateau de Léon”, St, Étienne, France

Workshops

2015 Workshop of two artists at Rowaq Al Balqaa Art Gallery with
Syrian artist Adi Atassi, Amman

• 13 Solo shows across the Middle East since 1994
• Participant at the 2015 London Global Art Fair
• Beirut Art Fair 2014

In my work I focus on the human figure as a means of expression. I see the human form as a maleable energy, displaying infinite emotions and states of being. By slightly distorting the human form according to my own aesthetic, I delve deeper inside my own soul, searching for meaning and truth, and simultaneously tapping into a more universal state of 'being'. The complexities of human life are entangled, distorted, and later deciphered differently by the observer, each according to his or her own truth.
Earthly concerns that bind one's vision to a particular time and place do not interest me, despite the trend to do so. My art is my vehicle to escape; it is my 'Magic Carpet' that sweeps me away from a sometimes unsightly reality, into a world of magic, purity, peace, and love. I am transported to a place that is not where the 'body' is but rather where the 'soul' is.

Michael Angelo once said that, ''Every block of stone has a sculpture inside it and it is the task of the sculptor  to find it...''
I believe this to be true for painting as well. The artwork is already there , in the white of the canvas, waiting to be uncovered!  And just like the sculptor looking for his sculpture in the stone, I create, search, destroy,and create again... my own truth.