Helen Khal was a painter and art critic born in Pennsylvania in 1923 to a Lebanese American family originating from Akkar, in the north of Lebanon. She fell ill with tuberculosis in her early twenties, and was bed-ridden for months, a time during which she took up drawing and painting. In 1946, she started attending the Académie Libanaise Des Beaux-Arts (ALBA) in Beirut and graduated in 1948 with a degree in painting. She held her first exhibition in 1960 in Galerie Alecco Saab, Beirut. Her contemporaries were Aref El Rayess, Huguette Caland and Shafic Abboud. Khal’s work is abstract, focusing on geometric shapes and experimenting with color fields. Steering away from the conceptual and symbolic, she leaves room for the viewers’ own emotions and visions to roam beyond her art and into the personal expression of their psyche. In 1949, she moved to New York to continue her studies at the Art Students League and in 1963, came back to Beirut to establish and direct Lebanon’s first permanent art gallery, Gallery One.

Helen Khal’s works were exhibited worldwide, namely in Beirut, Alexandria, Washington D.C., Tokyo and Sao Paulo.  She has won the Medal of Honor in Alexandria in 1969, and has released two publications focusing on Lebanese artists. Some of the collections that include her works are the Ramzi and Saeda Dalloul Art Foundation, Beirut, Lebanon; the Nicolas Sursock Museum, Beirut, Lebanon; Barjeel Art Foundation, Sharjah, UAE and the American University of Beirut.

In this work, Helen Khal shines a spotlight on the color blue, honoring her fascination with colors. Strokes of yellow, green and white blend in with the light blue of the central moon, creating a captivating, textured glow. Although unsigned on the front, this piece is immediately recognizable as Helen Khal’s creation due to its controlled and meticulously planned, yet simple and serene composition.