As part of the integrated project of the Polo del ‘900 Polo internazionale, Being Twenty in Syria and Lebanon, the Balkans, Egypt, and Turkey, for the series Being Twenty in Syria and Lebanon, the Nocentini Foundation and the Salvemini Institute present the event Laura Cappon meets Lena Merhej. Moderated by Gianluca Costantini.
Saturday, November 27 at 5:30 PM, streaming on the Facebook and YouTube channels of the Polo del ‘900.
Translated by Nicolas Quendoz.
Lena Merhej was born in Beirut in 1977 to a German mother and a Lebanese father. After studying graphic arts, she became an illustrator of picture books and comics. She has written and illustrated over 25 titles and, together with her group Samandal, founded the first fanzine and comic book publisher in the Arab world. She taught illustration and animation at AUB (American University of Beirut) and continues her research in an interdisciplinary field that lies between graphic arts, narratology, and new technologies. Her first comic book I Think We’ll Be Better Prepared for the Next War (2006) was the best-selling book in Lebanon in 2007, and her comics have received numerous international awards. She was the director of the Beirut Animated Festival and worked with Tosh Fesh to promote comics and animation in Arab countries.
Laura Cappon is a correspondent for Petrolio, a current affairs program broadcast on Rai 2. She graduated in Oriental Languages and Cultures from the University of Bologna and began working in local news during her university years. In 2011, she moved to Egypt for four years, covering the post-revolution period for various Italian and international outlets. She has also worked in Iraq, Tunisia, Morocco, Lebanon, Qatar, and Ukraine. She collaborates or has collaborated with Gad Lerner’s reports on Rai 3, Skytg 24, Il Fatto Quotidiano, Al Jazeera English, The New Arab, Swiss Radio and Television, and Radio Popolare. In 2013, she won the L’Isola che c’è award for her coverage of the Egyptian coup, and in 2017, she won the Inviata di Pace award from the Mediterranean Women Journalists Forum for her articles on the death of Giulio Regeni.
The integrated project Polo internazionale: Being Twenty in… Syria and Lebanon, the Balkans, Egypt, and Turkey is part of the 2021 cultural program of the Polo del ‘900 Where the Winds Lead: Crises, Transitions, and Opportunities of the New Decade, coordinated by the Vera Nocentini Foundation and the Gaetano Salvemini Institute of Historical Studies.
