São Paulo – Involved in the art world since his childhood, São Paulo native Tarek Mourad does not restrict himself to any single type of art-making. He creates drawings, paintings, engravings and photographs. Anonymous people are his primary source of inspiration in both Brazil and Lebanon, where he has lived for two years now.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
“I devote myself to art. I don’t see photography, painting or sculpture as separate entities. They are not separate languages. I strive to use as many mediums as I can,” the artist says. Mourad spent nearly all his life in Brazil. For a few years during the 90s, he moved to Lebanon to study advertising design. Now, he has decided to return to his family country again, and settled in Beirut. <\/p>\n
Mourad doesn’t know how many artworks he has created, but says drawings turn into paintings, which can evolve into sculptures. Inspiration arrives and a new piece gets made. <\/p>\n
And where does inspiration come from? “It could be a dream or a new anonymous face on the street,” he says. Anonymous faces, by the way, have been featured in two exhibits of his: <i>Anonymous Faces<\/i> and <\/i>Faces of São Paulo<\/i>, both with snapshots of unknown people, many of whom lived on the streets.<\/p>\n
As a Brazilian of Lebanese descent, Mourad contrasts those two cultures in his work. “In Lebanon, the people who live on the streets are Syrians, Pakistanis, Filipinos, Bedouins. It’s hard to find a Lebanese national living on the street. In Brazil, the street people are actually Brazilians,” he remarks. <\/p>\n
The question of old age is also dealt with differently in the two countries, he says. “In Lebanon, there aren’t that many nursing homes for the elderly. Here, elderly people are believed to enlighten households. It’s an honor having an elder at home,” says Mourad. <\/p>\n
As a breather from the harsh social reality he faces in his quest for unknown, overlooked countenances, Mourad does abstract paintings. “The abstract ones are my outlet. My primary subject is anonymous faces, and it’s a very grim subject,” he ponders. <\/p>\n
Mourad’s work has been exhibited at places such as the Setubal Town Council, in Portugal, the São Paulo Town Hall, and the Brazil-Lebanon Cultural Center, in Beirut. Cultural centers are the venues the artist likes best. “I have a predilection for exhibiting at cultural centers, because they give me a chance to reach more people than I would at a gallery,” he points out. <\/p>\n
The next Anonymous Faces exhibit opens in Paris, France, on September 29 at Le Pavé d’Orsay. In Lebanon, Mourad’s work can be purchased from the galleries Artlab (www.art-lab.me) and Saatchi Art (www.saatchiart.com\/tarekmourad).<\/p>\n
Find out more about the artist’s work at www.tarekmourad.com.br.<\/p>\n
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A designer, photographer, painter, engraver and sculptor, S\u00e3o Paulo\u2019s Tarek Mourad takes inspiration from anonymous people to create his artworks. A resident of Beirut, he is getting ready to take his work to Paris.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2313,"featured_media":183485,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[89],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-53335","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-culture"},"wps_subtitle":"A designer, photographer, painter, engraver and sculptor, S\u00e3o Paulo\u2019s Tarek Mourad takes inspiration from anonymous people to create his artworks. A resident of Beirut, he is getting ready to take his work to Paris.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53335","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2313"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53335"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53335\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/183485"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}