Belvento, the book that fell through the cracks

Yesterday, within the euphoria of rehousing my books (here), one book fell through the cracks - simply because it was published while we (that would be my digtial advisor Patrick Chemali - no relation - and myself) were right in the middle of the technical jumble.

Called "Belvento" (which alongside McCondo, is up there with those mythical places in literature) and obviously inspired by Georges Schehadé (or Chehade, there are many variations to writing the name), and a visit to the very long time rental he lived in Beirut. Just to be clear, if you do not understand Chehade it is not fault of yours, either you do or you don't.

So "Belvento" (the mythical village from his play "L'emigre de Brisbane") is just as absurd, and hopefully just as fun and oblique as the great playwriter and poet's work.

Originally the project dates back to 2013, and just as always, I go back to my own archive or someone else's and reinterpret it. Please have a glance at Belvento here.

A new link for my books

In 2003, in Saudi Arabia out of all places, I self-published a poetry anthology by the name of "The Wit and Wisdom of Arty Stotle".... Then in 2009 came the first tome of Archewallogy which made it to the cover of the best selling Danish newspaper on its Sunday edition - the book was free of charge and many (as in thousands!) of copies were distributed. 

This has launched the floodgates of my self-publishing (for a while it was under the banner of 7UPstairs Publishing). There were many books I published for other people, several collaborations, a lot of accompanying videos, and each book remains lovely to revisit.

For a long time the books were housed on a different platform, but now came the time to reorganize them under my own website. Yes, some culling was necessary - no poetry anthologies, no plays, only graphic and visual books remained. But what a joy to look at them some after years of their original publication.

Surely, sometimes I say "oh I used too many colors here", "I should have sacrificed this page", but by and large, I look at them with (biased, I know) enormous pride. They remain a testimony of someone working tirelessly, recklessly, and strenuously with a touch of OCD to boot. Most of these books were self-made from cover to cover (save for 3 volumes of Archewallogy - the first, second and Archewallogy San Francisco).

Do they look self-made? Probably. Does it matter? Not in the least.

I am indebted for my digital consultant Patrick Chemali - no relation - for putting up with me (a pseudo-luddite because all the self-made books were not made on Photoshop but.... on Paintbrush!) and - just for my credit - I could be the only client in the world who has asked "to make my logo smaller" (as it was ginormous on the original page!).

Please enjoy all the books on this link here! 

Elections 2022: On selling your vote.

Photo by Tarek Chemaly

Selling your vote. Well, let's be honest, can you have an election without vote-buying and falsification?

Short answer: No.

Well, ad agencies jumped at this. Leo Burnett teamed with Lebanese Transparency Agency (LTA) and FP7 McCann with Annahar. Each from a different standpoint.

OK, so LTA went back to the Lollar (term originally coined by Dan Azzi, which if I understood correctly gave his blessing to the campaign, but without Patrick Chemali's logo). Actually, tangible and physical prints/designs of Lollar (that the LTA dubbed as "currency of corruption) were introduced. On May 13, this is when there will be an ATM which will dispense such bills which will move from Dora, to Sassine Square and Raouche.

Annahar went with another idea - since votes will be bought anyhow - might as well advise the votes how much their vote is really worth (with apparently a smart algorithm which calculates exactly how much it is worth compared to fuel, food, education costs etc....). They even launched a website: se3erlsot.com (which translates as price of the vote).

OK, you did not hear this from me but... Do I smell Cannes Lions entries here?