Zena el Khalil | The New York Review of Books

Zena el Khalil

Zena el Khalil was born in London in 1976 and has lived in Lagos, London, New York, Turin and Beirut. She is an installation artist, curator and cultural activist. During the July 2006 attacks on Lebanon, her blog beirutupdate.blogspot.com was published on CNN and the BBC and excerpted in The Guardian and Der Spiegel online. In 2008 she was invited to speak at the Nobel Peace Center, Oslo and in 2012 was named a TED Fellow. Beirut, I Love You, is currently on its way to becoming a feature film, winning every award at the Torino Film Lab. Zena lives and works in Beirut, and in an attempt to spread peace is often seen running around in a big pink wedding dress.

After the Occupation

“When the decision to pull out of Lebanon was announced, twenty-two years of Israeli occupation was dismantled in a matter of forty-eight hours. I guessed that the soldiers occupying our house were just about to sit down for lunch when they got the call. It was such a strange sight. Even the glasses were still filled with water. They didn’t even get the chance to have a sip.”

October 18, 2012