Facts & Figures

Arab Countries

15

Number of Submissions

300

Female Participation

43%

10th Mahmoud Kahil Award Winners

April 2025

Rada and Mutaz Sawaf Center for Arab Comics Studies AUB

Editorial Cartoons

Tawfik | Egypt
Tawfik is an award-winning visual artist, art director, and professional illustrator with expertise in animation, illustration, fine art, and children’s literature. A graduate of the Faculty of Fine Arts in Cairo, Tawfik is the founder and creative director of Majid Animation Production Studio. He has led artistic direction for notable animated series, including The Adventures of Fateen and Zakia Al-Zakia.

Tawfik’s extensive experience spans roles as a technical director and designer for animation projects, alongside a long tenure as a comics artist for Basim and Majid magazines. He won First Prize in Journalistic Comics at the Cairo International Comics Festival in 2016.

Co-founder of the award-winning TOK-TOK magazine, Tawfik has participated in international exhibitions, published works referenced in the Encyclopedia of Arab Caricature and Comic Artists, and collaborated with Harvard University on Middle Eastern comics. He also published Tawfik-Comics, a collection of his works spanning thirteen years.

@tawfi2

Rada and Mutaz Sawaf Center for Arab Comics Studies AUB

Graphic Novels

Mohamed Ali | Egypt
Mohamed Ali is an accomplished Cairo-based art director and comic book artist with a Bachelor degree in Graphic Design and Illustration. His work spans various storytelling mediums, including children’s books, comics, editorial illustrations, and storyboards for both live-action and animated productions. He currently serves as an art director for an animation studio.

Ali has participated in numerous collective art exhibitions and was awarded the Angoulême Maison des Auteurs art residency in 2020. His comic work was featured in the 2018 Mahmoud Kahil Award annual book, and his contributions to animation have earned him two awards in Cairo and Dubai.

A published author, Ali has released two comic books, published consecutively in 2021 and 2022. His work continues to shape the fields of comics and animation, establishing him as a leading figure in contemporary visual storytelling.

@moealiart

Rada and Mutaz Sawaf Center for Arab Comics Studies AUB

Comics

Nour Haidar | Lebanon

Nour Haidar is a talented 24-year-old illustrator and comic book artist based in Beirut, a city rich with unique and inspiring stories. Her passion for the arts began in childhood, but it was during her studies at the Académie Libanaise des Beaux-Arts that she developed a deep interest in illustration and sequential storytelling.

Since then, Haidar has embarked on a diverse range of projects, exploring various mediums and styles with each new endeavor. Her artistic curiosity has driven her to experiment with different themes and techniques, always seeking to tell compelling stories through her work. Haidar believes that every image holds its own narrative, and her creations reflect this belief, capturing the essence of the stories that surround her.

@nourhaidar_

Rada and Mutaz Sawaf Center for Arab Comics Studies AUB

Graphic Illustration

Sally Samir | Egypt
Sally Samir is an Egyptian visual artist and children’s book illustrator who graduated from the Faculty of Fine Arts in Cairo in 2011. Since 2014, she has dedicated herself to illustrating children’s books having worked on over 25 titles with publishing houses both in Egypt and internationally.

She has participated in various exhibitions and received notable recognition, including the State Encouragement Award in Arts for pre-school children’s book illustrations in 2022. Her book Where, Moon? won the Best Design and Production Award at the Lebanon International Book Fair.

Her creative and impactful approach to illustrations continues to shape the field of children’s literature, where she brings vibrant stories to life with every new project.

@sally_samir_

Rada and Mutaz Sawaf Center for Arab Comics Studies AUB

Chilldren’s Book Illustration

Shiroug Mohamed Ali Idris | Sudan
Shiroug is a talented artist based in Sudan, with over five years of experience as a freelance illustrator. She has worked on a diverse range of projects, including children’s books, animation, comics, and editorial illustrations.

Her work is deeply inspired by African folklore and mythology, with a strong emphasis on representing Afro-Arabian heritage. Through her illustrations, Shiroug seeks to highlight and preserve the rich narratives of her roots, creating art that resonates with both historical depth and contemporary relevance.

@shiroug_art

Mka 2024 Winners
Rada and Mutaz Sawaf Center for Arab Comics Studies AUB
Amaal Khattab
The artist Amaal Khattab lived in the Sayyida Zeinab district, one of Cairo’s most historically and religiously significant neighborhoods. She completed her secondary education at Helmiya Secondary School for Girls before following her artistic passion to the Faculty of Applied Arts, where she graduated with distinction.

In the early 1980s, Amaal Khattab had the opportunity to join the team of artists and illustrators at her favorite magazine, “Samir”. There, she participated in drawing stories and coloring illustrations at her small desk, surrounded by fellow artists and creative collaborators, including Mohamed El-Tahamy and Alaa El-Saeed – the artist behind the redesign of Samir’s character in the early 1980s.

Her artistic and aesthetic maturity reached its peak in the 1990s, where she skillfully and professionally brought these iconic images to life, making Samir’s covers and pages vibrantly beautiful and full of life.

Amaal Khattab was selected among 12 artists who applied for the position of replacing Samir’s illustrator. She proved her talent by illustrating Samir and his friend Tahtah for five years before leaving Egypt for Lebanon, where she helped establish Bisat Al-Reeh Magazine in the United States, where she was hosted by Walt Disney in his studios. She continued working in illustration for 22 years thereafter. Amaal worked at Samir Magazine from the early 1980s until her retirement around 2017.

Rada and Mutaz Sawaf Center for Arab Comics Studies AUB
Maamoul Press

Maamoul Press is a small press and collective working at the intersection of comics, printmaking, and book arts, fostering by-us for-us storytelling from marginalized communities through publishing, workshops, and more. We orient our work, and call on you, to refuse and resist zionist and imperialist hegemony everywhere, towards collective liberation.

Founded in 2019 in metro Detroit, Maamoul launched with an 8-week comics workshop that provided an intensive learning experience to local participants, as they created their own comics zines. Since then we have published numerous books, zines, and prints, curated the work of our artist members for exhibitions, and tabled at fairs across North America. Our work is by and for artists and communities from SWANA and other marginalized backgrounds, working against hostile publishing landscapes that seek to suppress and control our narratives. We are rooted in a collaborative and DIY ethos with a long tradition in printmaking and zine-making spaces, forging alternative, community-based modes of publishing, and sharing knowledge and skills through always free workshops and programs. Where possible we have directed proceeds to supporting various causes locally as well as in our homelands, with a focus since October 2023 on mutual aid efforts in Gaza, while also directly supporting Gazan artists through publishing their work. Find us at maamoulpress.com and @maamoulpress.

10th Mahmoud Kahil Award 2025 Finalists

Editorial Cartoon

  • Naser Jaafari | Jordan
  • Mohamed Afefa | Palestine
  • Mohamed Zahran | Egypt

Graphic Novel

  • Mohammad Sabaaneh | Palestine
  • Karen Keyrouz | Lebanon
  • Mohamad Kraytem | Lebanon

Comics

  • Farid Nagy Nasr | Egypt
  • Tawfik | Egypt
  • Mai Koraiem | Egypt

Graphic Illustration

  • Yousif Elamin | Sudan
  • Mahmoud Abdou | Egypt

Children’s Book Illustration

  • Baraa Alawoor | Palestine
  • Hayam Safwat | Egypt

Meet the Jury

Sussi Bech, born 1958, is a Danish comic artist and illustrator who graduated from the School of Applied Arts in Copenhagen in 1983. Her books have been published in 13 countries, earning widespread recognition.

Her most notable work is the comic series about Nofret, which follows a girl navigating the political and religious intrigues of pharaoh Akhenaten’s reign. The final installment of the series was released in April 2022. In total, she has written and illustrated 34 comic books, including He Electrified the World, the best-selling Danish comic book of its year. Additionally, she has illustrated nearly 200 children’s books.

Bech has received all major Danish comics awards, and in 2015 was honored with the Adamson statuette from the Swedish Comics Academy in Stockholm. Her works have been exhibited 37 times in eight countries, including France and Germany.

More details can be found at: www.sussibech.dk.

Doaa ElAdl is an Egyptian cartoonist from Dumiat with a degree in Fine Arts, specializing in Theater and Film. She has worked as a political cartoonist for AlDostour, Sabah El Kheir, and Rose Al Youssef, and is currently a cartoonist for Al-Masry Al-Youm. Her work has appeared on international platforms such as Cartoon Movement, Iran Cartoon, and the United Arab Emirates’ daily Al-Ro’ya.

Doaa has participated in numerous exhibitions, and she has received numerous awards, including the Egyptian Syndicate of Journalists’ Best Cartoon (2009) and the Mustafa and Ali Amin prize (2015). In 2016, the BBC named her one of the most inspirational and influential women of the year. She later received the Mahmoud Kahil Award (2017) and (2024) both in the Editorial Cartoons category, was nominated by Cartoon Home Network International in Norway among the Top Ten Cartoonists in the world (2018), and won First Prize at the Women Cartoonist International Award (2020).
@doaa.eladl.cartoon

Paul Gravett is a London-based writer, historian, curator and lecturer specialising in international comics art. With over forty years of experience in publishing and promoting comics, he also directed the London comics festival, Comica.

He has written, co-written, edited or contributed to more than twenty books on comics and has curated exhibitions at institutions such as The British Library, the National Comics Centre in Angoulême, The Centre Pompidou, and The Barbican Centre, where he organized the first exhibition of Asian Comics, currently touring museums in the USA.

His upcoming projects include curating for the Quentin Blake Centre for Illustration, opening in London 2026, and contributing to a new museum of graphic narrative in Brussels. More details can be found at www.paulgravett.com and @paul_gravett.

Maya Fidawi is a Lebanese illustrator who graduated from the faculty of Arts at the Lebanese University in 2000. While pursuing her studies, she worked as a decorative painter and later became a freelance illustrator for various advertising agencies.

In 2004, she illustrated her first book and has since illustrated over 44 books for publishers in Lebanon and internationally.

Fidawi has received nine national and international awards, including the Etisalat Children’s Book Award for Book of the Year (2014) and Best Illustrated Children’s Book (2017), as well as the 2nd Mahmoud Kahil Award in the Children’s Book Illustration category (2017). In 2024, she was nominated for the prestigious Hans Christian Andersen Award.

She has conducted illustration workshops in Brazil, Morocco, Italy, Turkey, UAE, Jordan, Egypt and Lebanon. Based in Beirut, she runs regular workshops and is a part time instructor at AUB and ALBA, teaching both manual and digital illustration.
@mayafidawi

Jad is a renowned Lebanese comics artist and critic, recognized as a pioneer of comics in the Arab world and a key reference on the subject. He is the author of If Shehrazad Drew: Critical Writings on Arab Comics and has authored the region’s very first graphic novel for adults, Carnaval, as well as the first comprehensive study on the history of comics in the Arab world.

Jad has received several awards for his contributions to the field. His works A Thousand and One Nights and Shehrazade are part of the permanent collection at Le Musée de la Bande Dessinée (The International Comics Museum) in Angoulême, France.
georgeskhouryjad.wordpress.com

Facts &
Figures

Arab
Countries

15

Number of
Submissions

370

Female
Participation

42%

7th Mahmoud Kahil
Award Winners

March 2022

Editorial Cartoons

Raafat Al Khatib | Jordan

Alkhatib is a political cartoonist and satirist from Jordan currently living in the US. His work experience spans over a decade of professional publishing on platforms like Al Jazeera, Al Hudood Network, and The Cartoon Movement. He is an active member in Cartooning for Peace. Alkhatib is a political cartoonist and satirist from Jordan currently living in the US. His work experience spans over a decade of professional publishing on platforms like Al Jazeera, Al Hudood Network, and The Cartoon Movement. He is an active member in Cartooning for Peace.

@rafaatcartoons

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Graphic Novels

Barrack Rima | Lebanon

Born in 1972, in Tripoli, Lebanon, Barrack Rima lives in Brussels. She is a comics artist and a film maker, and a member of Samandal Comics Association (Beirut).Alkhatib is a political cartoonist and satirist from Jordan currently living in the US. His work experience spans over a decade of professional publishing on platforms like Al Jazeera, Al Hudood Network, and The Cartoon Movement. He is an active member in Cartooning for Peace.Alkhatib is a political cartoonist and satirist from Jordan currently living in the US. His work experience spans over a decade of professional publishing on platforms like Al Jazeera, Al Hudood Network, and The Cartoon Movement. He is an active member in Cartooning for Peace.

barrackrima.com

Comics

Mohamad Salah | Egypt

A Cairo-born and based comic book artist with a knack for social commentary and science-fiction. He graduated with honors in 2005 from the faculty of fine arts, Helwan University, Painting department.

@abusalah

Graphic Illustration

Karen Keyrouz | Lebanon

Karen Keyrouz is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice is a “va-et-vient” between drawing, comics and filming. She launched her first graphic Novel “Flux et Reflux” (2018) with the Académie Libanaise des Beaux-Arts, where she earned her master’s degree (2015).

karenkeyrouz.com

Chilldren’s Book Illustration

Baraa Al Awoor | Palestine

Born and based in Gaza, Alawoor earned her bachelor degree in English teaching language in 2015. She worked as a freelancer on illustrating children’s books and outreach material.

behance/baraaawoor

Mka 2021 Winners  Mka 2023 Winners

ALI MANDALAWI

Mandalawi is one of the most outstanding caricaturists in Iraq and the Arab World. He is also a books and magazines illustrator, a graphic designer, and a writer. He studied at the Institute of Fine Arts at Baghdad University in 1979 from which he obtained his BA degree in 1986. His love for colored pens and paper began when he was only seven years old. Inspired by the green river-lands of his childhood, the landscape infused his art with joyful colors. He explains that he draws his color palette from the mountains, lakes, and villages of Kurdistan.

SKEFKEF COLLECTIVE

“Skef kef” aims to encourage the production of comics, and to promote their accessibility across the Maghreb. In June 2013, Salah Maloulli gathered a group of Moroccan artists, including Mahdi el Anasi (from the Brain Oil Factory collective), Mohamad el Ballawi (Rebel Spirit), and Husni Mokhales (poet and playwright). Later on, other artists joined and contributed to this initiative, most notably Ayoub Abid, Salaheddin Basti, and Mohamad Rahmo. Read more

7th Mahmoud Kahil
Award 2022 Finalists

Editorial Cartoon
Bernard Haje | Lebanon
Graphic Novel
HONORARY MENTION Deena Mohamed | Egypt
Where to Marie| Lebanon
Comics
Lena Merhej | Lebanon
Farid Nagy Nasry | Egypt
Graphic Illustration
Aliaa Abou Khaddour | Syria
Sarah Saroufim | Lebanon
Children’s Book Illustration
Hanane Kai | Lebanon
Omar Lafi | Jordan

Meet the Jury


  • Julie Tait

    UK


  • Noha Hobaib

    Tunisia


  • Mohamad ElSeht

    Egypt


  • Haitham ElSeht

    Egypt


  • George Khoury

    Lebanon

Julie Tait is the Founder Director of the United Kingdom’s Lakes International Comic Art Festival. This festival is recognized as one of the leading comic art events in the world, with more than 27 international partnerships and an array of commissions, spanning its nine years of existence. Tait has a long and rich experience in establishing and running festivals. From developing and working on book, film and television festivals, to multi-art form and South Asian performing arts festivals. In 2008, she won a commission from the London 2012 Olympics to create and deliver a large-scale outdoor arts program during the four years leading up to 2012. Having been originally trained as a musician, she also enjoys exploring new cultures and the outdoors, and has a particular love for comedy in all its guises.
comicartfestival.com
Noha Habaieb is an illustrator working between Doha and Tunis. She is one of the founders of the LAB619 collective, a Tunisian comic magazine launched in 2013. Habaieb also co-organizes and takes part in artistic residencies around migration, identity and borders. In 2017, she co-founded Atelier Glibett, an illustration studio based in Tunis.
@nohahabaeib
Mohamed Elseht is a comic book artist and cultural manager, and is one of the Egyptian twin duo (Twins Cartoon). He studied at the Animation Department at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the Minia University, in Egypt. For over 10 years, Mohamed has taught the art of comics at various workshops and festivals around Egypt and the world. As a program officer and cultural consultant of the Sultan foundation, he worked on the historic, and recently restored, Maq‘ad of Sultan Qaitbey in the cemeteries of old Cairo. He also organizes various cultural activities (training courses, workshops, performances, exhibitions, and medical convoys) to engage children and young-adults in civic work, awareness campaigns relating to local heritage and history. Elseht is a co-founder of the Cairo Comix International Festival and Garage Comics Magazine. The Garage collective was introduced to the Arab comics scene in 2015. It has since grown into a safe haven for artists and writers who retain their creative freedom and challenge the Egyptian and Arab public with new perspectives.
@twinscartoon
Haitham Elseht is a comic book artist and lecturer, and is one of the Egyptian twin duo (Twins Cartoon). An avid reader of comic books from a young age, he enrolled in the Animation Department at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the Minia University, in Egypt. Having graduated in 2008, he was inspired by the cosmopolitan city of Cairo, characterized by its rich visual identity, culture, and various urban spaces. As an independent artist and cultural actor, he was preoccupied by the censorship and harsh regulations of the visual art market (comics especially) taking place in the Arab world during the past decade. In 2014, Elseht started the Kawkab Elrasameen initiative, which has now grown into a large community of almost 2000 active members. This community caters to independent young artists. It organizes indoor and outdoor artistic gatherings across the streets of Egypt and various spots around the world. Visual art and comics workshops are also organized for advanced, underground, and amateur artists. Elseht is also a co-founder of Cairo Comix International Festival.
@twinscartoon
George Khoury is a renowned Lebanese comics artist and critic. He has published several comic albums (graphic novels) and series in daily newspapers since the 1980s and received several awards. He authored several articles and essays on the history of comics in the Arab world, and continues to write critically on comics from the region. He has been head of the Animation Department at Future Television since its launch in 1993, and teaches at the Lebanese American University in Beirut.
@georgekhouryjad