Galerie Claude Lemand

Carole Dagher, Fatima El-Hajj ou le bon­heur de peindre, in L’Orient Le Jour (quo­ta­tion).

’ In her own par­tic­ular way of cap­turing light and colour, Fatima El-Hajj intro­duces a breath of Lebanese air, that of sharing and of friend­ship, epit­o­mised by coffee time, by the after­noon nap, by the neigh­bour’s visit, or by a pas­toral lunch. The viewer falls into the dream of this daily hap­pi­ness which is brought to life by Fatima El-Hajj’s paint­brush, as if to ward off the sur­rounding world’s frenzy and wor­ries. As she explains, I am a girl from the vil­lage, where friends and neigh­bours have pre­served their wel­coming warmth. That is our life in Lebanon, not the other one, that which is imposed upon us, full of con­flicts and ten­sions. She rejects war and what it causes, even at an artistic level. Fatima El-Hajj is con­vinced that the artist’s voca­tion is to bring joy. A great suc­cess! ’

Translated from French by Valérie Hess.