(b. 1970)
Born in Beirut, Lebanon in 1970, Sahmarani graduated from the Atelier Met de Penninghen in Paris, France in 1989. He derives his inspiration from the themes of art history, surging between his Western cultural education and his oriental identity. Islamic and Mesopotamian art with its iconography and history mixes in with Greco-Roman influences as well as the paintings of the great master including Uccello, Rubens and Picasso. Sahmarani has participated in a variety of solo exhibitions in London, Dubai, Canada and Beirut as well as group exhibitions in Munich, Washington D.C. and Mexico. His most recent group museum exhibitions are Told/Untold/Retold at the Arab Museum of Modern Art, Doha, Qatar in 2010 and The Feast of the Damned at the Museum of Art and Design, New York, USA in 2010. Sahmarani was also one of the three recipients of the prestigious Abraaj Capital Prize in 2010.