Zad Moultaka

Zad Moultaka is a prizewinning multidisciplinary visual artist and composer who was born in Wadi Chahrour, Lebanon and, today, lives and works between Beirut and Paris.

Immersed in the contemporary theatre world from an early age, he began painting and playing the piano at just five years old. Moultaka relocated from Lebanon to Paris in 1984. In 1989, he won First Prize at the Conservatoire National Superieur de Paris. Four years later, he decided to devote himself to composition and visual art. Trained in the discipline of Western musical writing but linked naturally to his Mediterranean roots, Moultaka has created his own musical language and won several prestigious prizes for his music creations.

His career in the visual arts has been equally successful, spanning several mediums that include installation, painting, photography and video. Indeed, a drive to explore these two worlds and dovetail them in harmony is at the core of his practice. 

Many of his works have been acquired by private collectors and institutions, such as: the Boghossian Foundation, Belgium; Fonds Claude et France Lemand, Institut du Monde Arabe (IMA), Paris ; FFA Private Bank, Lebanon ; Jean Garcin Fontaine de Vaucluse, History Museum, France; and Arsenal of Metz, France.

Moultaka’s visual art has been exhibited worldwide, including at several landmark events, such as the reopening of the Sursock Museum, Beirut, in 2023. Other key career milestones included being selected by Maison Louis Vuitton to design a trunk to mark the 200th birthday in 2021 of its founder. 

In 2017, Moultaka was chosen to represent Lebanon at the 57th Venice Biennial International Art Exhibition, creating a monumental visual and sound installation titled ‘ŠamaŠ, Crier la Paix’, for the Lebanese Pavilion. The installation travelled to Lebanon, where it was displayed at the Sursock Museum in 2018 and then on to Finland, where it was shown at Suomenlinna, Helsinki, in the same year. It is currently being exhibited at the Institut du Monde Arabe until April 2025. 

In 2024, Moultaka created an installation titled ‘Lahab & Oro Terram’, shown at the Beiteddine Art Festival, Beiteddine Palace and had a solo show named ‘Oro Tenebris’, at Galerie Tanit Beirut. Other recent exhibitions of his work include: ‘Reliquien’, Tanit Gallery, Munich, Germany (2023); ‘Apocalypse 6.08’, Aedaen Gallery, Strasbourg (2021); ‘The Shadow’, Totah Gallery, New York (2020); ‘Land escape’, Institut du Monde Arabe, Paris (2019); ‘Don’t Fall’, Oscar Niemeyer Dome, Tripoli, Lebanon, [at the invitation of BeMa - the Beirut Museum of Art] (2018); ‘Murmures’, [installation as part of ‘Peindre la Nuit’], Centre Pompidou-Metz, France (2018); ‘Terra Incognita’, Beirut Art Fair (2018); ‘Astres Fruitiers’, Galerie Thierry Marlat, Paris and Saint-Pierre-aux-Nonnins, Arsenal de Metz (2017); Art Dubai (2017); ‘Temps et Surgissements’, L’Ermitage, Garches, France (2016); ‘Come in Terra’, Palazzo Albrizzi, Venice, 56th Biennial of Contemporary Art (2015); and ‘Le Feu de l’Eau’, Galerie Janine Rubeiz, Beirut (2013).

Group shows, include: ‘Après nous, le Déluge’, Domaine de Kerguéhennec, Bignan, France (2023); ‘Lebanon | Untitled’, organised by Janet Rady Fine Art and Artscoops, Cromwell Place, London (2024); ‘Cycles of Collapsing Progress’, Rashid Karami International Fair, Tripoli, Lebanon (2018); and the landmark ‘Rebirth’ show at Beirut Exhibition Centre, Beirut (2011).