Fadia Ahmad
Fadia Ahmad (born 1975) is a Lebanese photographer, artist, and filmmaker. Her practice focuses largely on creating narratives through her photography. She has created several series of portraits and landscapes, particularly in Africa, the Middle East and Asia. Engaged in humanitarian issues, she released two series of photographs and films about refugees in Lebanon entitled "It Could Be You." Background. Ahmad was born in Alicante, Spain to Lebanese parents who fled the Lebanese Civil War in the 1970s. In 1991, she returned to Lebanon and attended university at the L'Institut d'études scéniques, audiovisuelles et cinématographiques (IESAV) in Beirut . In addition to studying filmmaking and cinematography, she took courses in photography. Selected projects. Ahmad's most recent project is "Beyrouth/Beirut" (2019), an homage to the urban environment, complex demographics, and nostalgic architecture of Lebanon's capital. To complete this photo series, Ahmad walked a daily itinerary of 10,452 steps across the capital city from the neighborhood of Mar Mikhael to the Sporting Club, a social fixture located in the neighborhood of Raouché. The number of steps mirrors the square footage of the Lebanese national territory, indicating Beirut as a microcosm representing the entire country. This project exemplifies Ahmad ’s interest in and connection to, her homeland, particularly in the patchwork composition of Beirut, and, more broadly, her desire to address ongoing changes in the fabric of the city over the last decade. The project is divided into sections including urban geography, the train station or the lost time, architectural contrasts of past and present, the communities, street life, the fishermen and the seaside promenade and the Corniche. "Beyrouth/Beirut" was originally intended as a traveling exhibition. Its first destination was Beit Beirut in 2019, a historic house museum built in 1924 located on the historic Green Line (Lebanon ) which separated East and West Beirut during the Lebanese Civil War. The exhibition was later staged at the Jordan National Gallery of Fine Arts in Amman. In August 2021, Ahmad was a judge on Season 2 of the World Art Collector Incubator, a series dedicated to Lebanese artists launched on YouTube. The mission statement of the program aims to highlight and promote both established and promising artists. Section::::"Beirut, the Aftermath". In the wake of the 2020 Beirut Explosion on August 4, Ahmad started filming a documentary, based on "Beyrouth/Beirut," that examines the local population, historical architecture, and daily life  the aftermath of the blast. It features interviews with a wide gamut of individuals who bore witness to the tragic event. Of the documentary, the filmmaker said:"The news showed the blast and its aftermath, but not the psychological impact it had on Beirut’s residents; it was important for me to bring forth how huge the psychological impact of that blast was. People have so much to say, but they never had a chance to say it. The audience will notice the documentary will seem to end at different instances. This symbolizes our never-ending story. There is no defined  beginning, no defined end. We are a people perpetually on the cusp of death. Every time we think it’s the end, we continue.""Beirut, the Aftermath," Ahmad's first feature documentary film was launched in 2021. The film was featured in many film festivals and she won a number of awards including 2nd place in the Short Films category at the Lebanese Film Festival in Canada and four awards at the Five Continents International Film Festival 2021 in Venezuela.