18 July 2009

BEIRUT: Efforts to promote this fall's Francophone Games in Lebanon have been given a push by a cartoon competition to publicize the mascot for the competition, a bird-like creature named Cedrus, symbolizing Lebanon's cedars. Lina's Caf in Downtown Beirut hosted the announcement of the award for the best comic strip, featuring Cedrus, to promote the sixth edition of the Francophone Games, which kick off in September.

Submissions by nine finalists were on display on Wednesday evening and the winner, Mohammad Rifai, a second-year student at ALBA, received a check for $1,000, offered by Lina's.

Several thousand artists and athletes are expected to gather in Lebanon for the Francophone games, which celebrate the French language and the solidarity of French-speakers around the world.

For the cartoon competition, the entrants were asked to propose a short story inspired by the mascot, Cedrus, which also appears in the games' logo, as a sleek-looking phoenix-like figure. Cedrus was designed by Armand Homsi, a newspaper caricaturist who was also a member of the jury, which was made up of professional designers and illustrators.

"Mohammad Rifai was the only candidate to use both the mascot and the logo in his production," Homsi said. In a silent comic strip, the student tells the story of Cedrus' birth, who is transformed into, successively, a bird, a fish and an alien, and eventually becomes the figurative logo of the games. "We were also enchanted by the very cinematographic way of telling the story: no words are used, only drawings."

The absence of speech is precisely what attracted Nada Anid, one of the organizers.

"The goal of the French-speaking community is also to gather people who don't speak French. A comic strip is the perfect way to do it, as the drawing conveys a message by itself."

Illustrator Michelle Keserwany, 21, from USEK (Holy Spirit University of Kaslik), and Alexis Baghdadi, a 27-year old scenarist, worked together on the same project, while other participants worked alone. They opted for a different approach than the winner, using large amounts of text in their work.

"A comic strip isn't just about drawing, it is also a story. And a story is told through text. Our style is more classical," Baghdadi said.

The competition provided the opportunity to put the spotlight on young artists, as all the competitors were students, and displayed a range of graphic styles. Some artists used very vivid colors while others made use only of their black pens. "Taken all together, the level was very good," Homsi enthused.

Meanwhile, each of the participants achieved the same goal: to celebrate the French language. The work of the nine finalists will be published in the souvenir booklet handed out during the Francophone Games, which kick off in Beirut on September 27.

Copyright The Daily Star 2009.