UO Today interview: Omar Khouri, comics artist

Artist Omar Khouri was born in London and spent his childhood in Lebanon. In 2002, he graduated from Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston with a BFA in illustration. After spending a year in Los Angeles working in cinema and television, he returned to Beirut. In 2006, Khouri cofounded Samandal Comics Magazine, the first experimental comics periodical in the Arab world. He is currently Samandal’s Editor-in-Chief and one of its many international contributing artists. In 2010, Khouri's sociopolitical satire Utopia won Best Arabic Comic book at the Algerian International Comic Book Festival. His work spans many art forms including painting, comics, animation, theatre, film, and music. Khouri is currently artist-in-residence for the UO’s Comics and Cartoon Studies program. He is producing a U.N. report on the right to food in comics form as a collaboration with Law professor Michael Fakhri and English and Comics Studies professor Kate Kelp-Stebbins. This work is in conjunction with professor Fakhri’s appointment as Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food for the United Nations.