His work spans painting, drawing, illustration, sculpture, as well as writing. He completed his studies at the Académie Libanaise des Beaux-Arts (ALBA) in 1957, and in 1959, received a scholarship from the Embassy of France to pursue his studies in Paris at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts and the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. El Bacha’s illustrations have been featured in numerous poetry volumes, including Alain Jouffroy’s (1965), Léopold Senghor’s (1978), and Nadia Tueni’s (1983) and in many newspapers and journals including the Al Nahar and Assafir Newspaper, Lebanon and the Al Arabi Journal, Kuwait. His body of work also encompasses murals, mosaic, tapestry, furniture, ceramic and jewellery. Two of his most famous murals include the Club des Artistes mural, Vincennes, France, and the mosaic of the church of San Martino, Legnano, Italy. His work has been exhibited, among others, at the Alexandria Biennale (1962); the National Museum of Modern Art (Paris, 1964, 1966); the 6th Conches Biennale (Paris, 1965); the Kreisler Gallery (Madrid, 1978); the Institut du Monde Arabe (Paris, until present); The British Museum (London, 1989) and the Sursock Museum (Beirut, 2017) among others.
El Bacha wrote and illustrated several books of short-stories, fiction and plays in Arabic including the play “The Suicide” in 2009, and “The Night’s Sun” in 2012. Major prizes include the Love Prize and the Cita Eterna Prize. In his lifetime, El Bacha received numerous international prizes: he became a laureate of Lebanon’s Education Ministry in 1959, was awarded the Gold Medal of the Citta Eterna Prize, Rome, and the title Il premio Internazionale d’Arte, Ottrano d’Argento, both in Italy in 1976, as well as Spain’s Medal of the Order of Merit in 2012 and the Medal of Merit of the President, Lebanon, 2019. His works are part of numerous prominent private and public collections internationally.
Amine El Bacha worked between Beirut, Lebanon and Paris, France.
Courtesy of Mahita El Bacha Urieta, on behalf of the Amine El Bacha Foundation.
