LE PIANO ORIENTAL

The illustrator and comic artist Zeina Abirached was born in Beirut, the capital of Lebanon, in 1981. She studied Fine Art, specialising in Graphic Design in Lebanon, and Animation at the École Nationale des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, where she moved in 2004.

In 2006 she published her first illustrated book, a children’s story adapted from the short film Mouton, which she had directed herself. Shortly afterwards, her first two comics, Beyrouth-Catharsis and 38, rue Youssef Semaani, were published to great acclaim in France.

In Spain, and internationally, she made a name for herself with El juego de las golondrinas, a work that was highlighted at the Angoulême Festival as one of the best works of 2007. In 2015, she once again stood out at the Angoulême Festival with El piano oriental, for which she received the 2016 Phénix Award.

She combines her work as a writer and comic artist with that of an illustrator, and has undertaken major commissions for festival posters and book covers, amongst other projects.

Stéphane Tsapis is a passionate traveler, composer, and pianist who has forever been building bridges between his Mediterranean roots and multicultural Paris, the international gateway and melting pot where he grew up. 

In 2015, he formed a trio with Marc Buronfosse and Arnaud Biscay. They have since toured such varied places as Romania, Greece, Columbia, Japan, Mexico and Tadjikistan with their album “Border Lines”, not forgetting an occasional visit to France. 

As leader of the group Kaïmaki, Stéphane Tsapis produced the album “Mataroa” as a showcase for the spoken word, specifically his own father’s voice recounting the forced exile of Greek people caused by the civil war. With his album “Le Tsapis Volant”, ("The Flying Tsapis”, a pun on the French “tapis volant” for "magic carpet”), the aim was to blend the particular voice of the oriental piano, a singular musical instrument producing a unique sound, with female voices from wide-ranging backgrounds. It was meant as a musical retrospective featuring his artistic collaborations from the recent past.