Mother continues daughter’s art after losing her to Beirut blast

A young woman’s artistic dreams cut short by the 2020 Lebanon explosion is being carried further by her mother.

Beirut, Lebanon – In early 2020, Lebanese-Armenian designer Gaia Fodoulian was busy planning the launch of her new virtual gallery. The 29-year-old sought to support the region’s artists and designers with a further-reaching, modern platform. On August 4, 2020, her dreams were cut short by the massive explosion that rocked Beirut, devastating entire neighbourhoods, and destroying countless lives. Fodoulian was one of the 208 people killed in the blast that day. Three days after she passed away, her mother, Annie Vartivarian, decided to complete her daughter’s work in her memory. Earlier this month, the virtual platform Art Design Lebanon (AD Leb) launched “Everyone is the creator of one’s own faith”, a physical pop-up exhibition at the blast-damaged historic Tabbal Building.