Critical Distance Profile Type Artist

Ahmed Naji is the author of three novels, Rogers (2007), Using Life (2014), And Tigers to my Room (2020), and another non-fiction book (Rotten Evidence: Reading and writing in prison) as well as numerous blogs and other articles. His work has been translated into different languages including English, Italian, Spanish, and others.

Mazen El Sayed (aka El Rass) is a rapper and music producer from Tripoli, Lebanon. His discography includes 8 albums, the most recent is titled “Ard El Khof” , as well as more than 200 singles in collaboration with other music-makers and rappers from the region.

Anahita Norouzi is a multidisciplinary artist, originally from Tehran and active in Montreal since 2017. For the past four years, she has been traveling between Iran and Canada to conduct her research which lies at the intersection of colonial histories, experiences of immigration and displacement, and the issue of identity and memory.

Katherine Melançon’s practice is interested in the intersection of the natural and the technological. More recently, she has been exploring non-human beings’ agency; what could become of the world of art, if it was created with non-human people? Often using the starting point of scanography of natural specimens, she plants these new seeds in various materials, exploring images’ fluidity through cycles of metamorphosis between physical and digital soils.

Lamis Haggag is an Egyptian multimedia artist, living and working in Toronto since 2016. She received her MFA from The University of Calgary in 2013 and her BFA from Helwan University, Cairo in 2008. She participated in exhibitions and residencies in Toronto (Doris McCarthy AIR program), Montreal ( Artist in residence at Fonderie Darling), Calgary, St. Thomas Ontario, Cairo, Beijing, Dakar, Lagos, Berlin and Incheon. In addition to her art practice, Haggag is an art instructor, installer and proposal writer.