The French-American Cultural Foundation is saddened to learn that Lebanese-American artist Etel Adnan passed away on November 14, 2021 at her home in Paris. She was 96 years old.
Ms. Adnan was born in Beirut, Lebanon to a Greek mother and high-ranking Ottoman officer born in Damascus. She was educated in French schools in Lebanon and then studied at the Sorbonne in Paris. In 1955, Ms. Adnan moved to the United States for post-graduate studies at U.C. Berkeley and Harvard. Throughout her adult life, she lived in Beirut, Paris, and California.
She moved between art and writing, finding fame late in life for her work. Ms. Adnan is widely recognized as one of the most influential artists of the 21st century. In 2003, she was named “arguably the most celebrated and accomplished Arab American author writing today” by the academic journal MELUS: Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States.
In September, the French-American Cultural Foundation was proud to announce our support of “Etel Adnan: Light’s New Measure” which will be on display at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City through January 10, 2022.
Learn more:
Etel Adnan at Galerie Lelong & Co. Paris
Washington Post: Etel Adnan, celebrated writer who found late-in-life fame as a painter, dies at 96
ARTnews.com: Etel Adnan, Influential Lebanese American Writer and Artist, Has Died at 96
artnet: ‘She Gave Us Confidence’: Gallerists, Curators, and Friends Remember the Trailblazing Artist and Poet Etel Adnan, Who Has Died at 96
