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About Lamia Abi Azar:

Lebanese performer and drama-therapist, based in Beirut.

Born in 1978, Lamia Abi Azar acquired a degree in Clinical Psychology at the St. Joseph University (USJ), Beirut, in 1999 and a degree in “History & Practice of Arts, Music and Performance”, with an emphasis on theater at the Universita Degli Studi Dell’Aquila, Italy, in 2004. Performer and drama-therapist, since 2001 Lamia developed a personal approach of drama therapy through continuous experimentation and practice, based on two separate schools: experimental theater and clinical psychology, applying theater and art as a tools of alternative expression, personal investigation and self affirmation. Since 2005, Lamia is conducting a drama therapy laboratory with children with multiple psycho-physical handicaps at “Ghassan Kanafani rehabilitation pre-school”, Mar-Elias Palestinian camp, Beirut, she has also led different workshops and training sessions in theater and drama therapy with children, adults and persons with special needs in diverse contexts. From 2008 till 2012 she led a laboratory of drama therapy with incarcerated youth at Roumieh jail, Lebanon. She was a drama instructor of Corporal Expression at the Institute de Psychomotricity, Saint Joseph University, Beirut from 2008 till 2011, and in 2008-2009 she worked as a technical advisor for Handicap International on a psychosocial project in Palestinian camps in Lebanon.She is a founding member of Zoukak.

About Zoukak:

“We created Zoukak in 2006 from a need to develop a professional continuity for our theater practice, a belief in this practice as a political and social involvement and a faith in collectivity as a position against marginalizing systems. The way we position ourselves outside the dominating political and social discourses in our context defines our political involvement as artists. An involvement that we strive to push beyond discourse through practical action within communities. 2006 also witnessed the Israeli war in Lebanon and the displacement of two million Lebanese from the south, and in 2007 all of the Naher el Bared Camp population moved to Beddawi Camp, and in both cases we found ourselves in these locations making psycho-social theater interventions through a special approach to drama therapy. Since then we tested and developed theatrical interventions in emergency situations and beyond, working with incarcerated youth, children with multiple disabilities, women subjected to domestic violence and other marginalized fractions of our society, while continuing to work with people affected directly and indirectly by the war. We broadened the frame of our interventions towards villages, schools and refugee camps across Lebanon seeking thereby to break the exclusivity of the cultural life in the city of Beirut, and confronting people in their areas, finding ways to connect our social interventions with our artistic investigations.”

Lamia Abi Azar, Omar Abi Azar, Hashem Adnan, Danya Hammoud, Junaid Sarieddeen, Maya Zbib