Helen Khal relocated to her familial routes in Lebanon, becoming a significant progenitor in the artistic movements of the 1960s. Recognised as an artist, critic, teacher and curator, Helen Khal was the co-founder of Gallery One, Lebanon’s first gallery strictly dedicated to contemporary art. Here, she gave space to global artists as well as several significant Lebanese female figures, exhibiting the art of pioneers, including Etel Adnan, Yvette Achkar, Saloua Raouda Choucair, Dorothy Salhab-Kazemi, Simone Fattal and Huguette Caland, who would become her closest friend. Rarely exhibited, Khal’s art is expressive of the breadth of her interests. Working with paper, later mounted onto Masonite as well as oils on small, but abundant canvasses, these works often represent colourful abstract forms. Khal’s life-long occupation with colour—a relationship she often correlated with her lyrical and literary pursuits—is represented here. The untitled works that stretch across decades, evince the propulsive energy and fervent imagination with which Khal approached each topographical plane.

^{*Currently exhibited at Aranya Art Center}