Wednesday, May 30, 2018

Tanmia Headquarters

Client: Tanmia
Hazmieh - SEPT 2014 - 2016


The design deviates from the traditional corporate office by emphasizing openness yet allowing for confidentiality where needed. Within a semi-open-plan layout, and while providing the required closed offices, small sound proof “pods” travel within the space, accommodating additional closed spaces for meeting, brain storming, shouting or meditating. These “pods” can be shared by different staff members depending on their needs. Double glazed glass walls enhance the openness of the office while providing the levels of privacy.
The new Tanmia office accommodates the needs for both privacy and interaction, promoting efficiency in terms of the use of space while boosting staff productivity as well as their sense of community. Reminding the users as well as the visitors of its most important values, etched on the walls and glass partitions, it also brings us closer to nature by providing greenery in many forms.











Friday, May 25, 2018

"Transference"

ATHR, 5TH EDITION OF 21,39 
"…And The Clocks Were Striking Thirteen " exhibition
Jeddah, February 2018
Clay, Earthenware
192x336 cm

… "the transference, which, whether affectionate or hostile, seemed in every case to constitute the greatest threat to the treatment, becomes its best tool"
Freud, S.
Today, 27 years after the Lebanese war stopped, many unresolved issues remain present. I am one of the lucky survivors. However I carry, buried deep inside of me, a feeling of loss.
In the same way that the death of a close friend’s parent can trigger one’s tears and grief over one’s own personal loss, by transference, the Syrian conflict has unleashed my feelings and my desire to express my frustration with the Lebanese war, the Syrian war, and wars in general.

I worked on the “qobqab”, the Syrian sabot, as a symbol to represent the absence, the loss. The loss of a culture, of an artisan’s society, of tradition, of a human being, of life.

Traditionally, these slippers are exposed by being hung on shop walls in the souks of Damascus or Aleppo. I chose that same way to exhibit the 144 clay “qobqab” to form a “memorial wall”, reminding us that wars never end with winners but only with victims.


“Cinderella’s slipper” or “Qobqab”

MACAM "Age of Ceramics Competition,
June 2017, first prize
Red and white clay, earthenware, milk fired