Youssef Abdelké

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: Samue

Photo

Youssef Abdelké was born in Kamishly, Syria, in 1951. He graduated from the Faculty of Fine Arts in Damascus in 1976 and from the Ecole nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris, in engraving, in 1986. In 1989 he took his PhD in plastic arts at the University of Paris VIII. Since 1973, from his first solo exhibition in Damascus, until today, he has shown in hundreds of exhibitions, both solo and group, in many Arab and European capitals and cities.

His works are very varied and include paintings, graphic design, posters, book covers, illustrations, humorous drawings and caricatures. Since 1972 he has illustrated more than 30 children’s books. He regularly publishes works in Arab newspapers. His works are in the public collections of the British Museum, the Institut du Monde Arabe, and the museum of Digne-lesbains.

He is one of the best-known caricaturists in the Arab world, and has published two studies on caricature, The History of Caricature in Syria (1975) and Arab Caricaturists and their Techniques (1989). Since the 1970s he has participated in many festivals of humorist drawings, including Bulgaria, Belgium, Montreal, Havana, Lisbon, Milan and Istanbul. Youssef Abdelké and his family live in Paris.