Youssef Nabil (1972)

Youssef Nabil

Youssef Nabil is an Egyptian photographer and artist living and working in Paris and New York. His work includes photography, painting, video and installations.

Nabil grew up in Cairo on films made during the golden age of Egyptian cinema, which strongly influenced his tastes. Nabil's distinctive technique of hand-colored silver-gelatin prints erases the stains of reality. Nabil shatters common notions of color photography and painting, as well as notions of the aesthetic sensibilities associated with art and pop culture.

Nabil is known for his photographs of Egyptian and international celebrities: Catherine Deneuve, Omar Sharif, Tracey Emin, Zaha Hadid, Robert De Niro and Marina Abramovic are just some of the many icons of the art and film world that Nabil has captured. Like all of his photographs, each portrait is made in the characteristic technique of hand-colored silver-gelatin prints. Nabil's numerous self-portraits reflect his feelings of loneliness, exile and longing. They also play with the notion of time. There is no time in Nabil's work; he lives and dwells in some other world of dreams.