It started, as these things sometimes do, with a phone call. As the crisis in Beirut and South Lebanon deepened this year, Cynthia Khoury, founder of the curatorial platform Artse, began reaching out to artists she knew in Dubai. She was not launching an initiative yet. She was simply trying to do something with the unease of watching a place she loves from a distance.
Within weeks, those individual conversations had become something larger: a regional collective effort. Garo Bardakjian, Director of Operations at the Dalloul Artist Collective, joined as advisor, lending his years of experience connecting artists, collectors, and institutions across Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. Together, they built Hold Beirut, a charity art auction bringing together 30 artists from Lebanon, Iraq, Tunisia, Palestine, Egypt, the UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Syria.
The premise is simple, and generous. Each artist donated a work at no cost, on equal terms, regardless of their standing in the market. The auction runs from July 28 to 31 on Artscoops, with every dirham of the proceeds going toward displaced families in Beirut and South Lebanon: shelter, food, medical care, distributed through trusted local contacts who identify need on the ground.
What makes the collection remarkable is its range. Dia Azzawi, one of Iraq’s most celebrated artists, contributes a woodcut estimated between $25,000 and $30,000, a work whose muted tones and calligraphic gestures carry decades of engagement with history and displacement. Raeda Ashour offers a hand embossed paper piece rooted in Islamic decorative traditions. Calligrapher Ghaleb Hawila and painter Taher Jaoui bring large scale, gallery ready canvases. Alongside them sit newer voices: Nour Saliba, Joseph Sayegh, and Tatiana Boulos, each pricing a first or early work modestly, each given exactly the same platform as the artists who came before them.
The collection also speaks a design language that feels close to home. Karim Tamerji and Elias El Hage, working together as Karim+Elias, present spheres cast in sand, a material they treat as a kind of earthen memory of the region. Dana Kamal‘s glazed ceramic figures explore fragility and resilience in monochrome. Rami Kadi, better known for his couture, brings an embroidered, cosmic composition dense with crystal and thread.
Hold Beirut is careful about what it is and is not. It is not a registered NGO, nor a long term relief organization. It describes itself, plainly, as a focused, time bound initiative built to turn donated art into immediate support, with a transparency update promised once the auction closes.
What remains, once the details are laid out, is something quieter than a market event. A group of artists, some decorated internationally, some selling their work for the first time, agreeing to give something up so that families they have never met might have somewhere to sleep tonight.
All funds raised will be donated to the Lebanese Red Cross and Beit el Baraka: https://artscoops.com/
BIDDING OPENS: Tuesday, 28 July, 11:00 AM (Beirut Time, GMT+3)
BIDDING CLOSES: Friday, 31 July, 3:00 PM (Beirut Time, GMT+3)
