Thirty-five yearsof faces.
He finds faces. He doesn't make them. Nemr Sidani has been drawing them since 1989 — first on paper, now straight off the street.
- The record
One line.
No eraser.Beirut, 1971 → Dubai, now. Every cartoon, mascot, and storyboard sits somewhere on this stroke.
Scroll - Chapter 01 / 05
Beirut
1971
Born on April Fools’ Day. He took it as instructions.
- 1971Born in Beirut, Lebanon — April the first.
- ’70sDrawing classes at Mr Hamweh’s school in Hamra.
- ’80sPrivate lessons with the late artist Hani Abi Saleh, in his studio La Palette.
- Chapter 02 / 05
Ink pays its way
1989 — 1997
University by day, deadlines by night — and a Moebius autograph in between.
- 1989Naji Al Ali International Caricature Competition.
- 1989–93BA in Interior Design at LAU, advertising courses on the side.
- 1990–95HAZAR kids’ magazine: Kachafo, Matnot, Mazen wa Zamano.
- 1991–93World Food Day brochures for the FAO and the Ministry of Agriculture.
- 1992Mascot for Al Dewan — the Middle East’s first Saudi fast-food chain.
- 1993–95SAWA magazine — drawn for UNICEF, for the kids of Lebanon.
- 1994An autograph from Moebius, Janine Rbeiz Gallery, Beirut.
- 1994–95Christmas cards for Mastercard. Twice.
- 1995MOCKER, mascot of M-Magazine — the region’s first music paper.
- 1995–97Co-founded Sheish Beish, the Arab world’s first adult comic magazine, and drew its star: Abu al Abed.
- 1996Mascot for the region’s first environment magazine; illustrated the voter’s Election Guide.
- 1997His caricatures run in An-Nahar — the page of Pierre Sadek.
- Chapter 03 / 05
The teacher
1998 — 2001
If you can draw it, you can teach it.
- 1998Children’s-book illustration workshop with Reinhard Michl, Goethe-Institut Beirut.
- 1998–2000Founded the Cartoon Club at International College, teaching cartoons and interior design.
- 2000Member, Syndicate of Professional Graphic Designers and Illustrators in Lebanon.
- 2001Drew every character in David Ward’s short film Dingewall and the Mouse.
- Chapter 04 / 05
The storyboard years
2002 — 2018
The brands you grew up with, drawn frame by frame.
- 2002–18Storyboards and director’s boards for Kellogg’s, Pampers, Pepsi, Toyota, Galaxy.
- 2011Founded InDesign, the Dubai interior practice — 750 projects and counting.
- 2017Mascot for SLANG online.
- 2018Illustrations for Hady Sy’s book Love Bible.
- Chapter 05 / 05
The street draws back
2020 — now
Lockdown closed the city. The city started making faces.
- Mar 2020The Corona cartoon — lockdown, day one.
- Apr 2020POSITIVO, the Corona Busters, the Earth Day cartoon. One a week.
- May 2020nemtoons.com goes live — 35 years in one archive.
- SinceThe street hands him faces: manholes, patched walls, cracked kerbs. This site is what he does with them.
- 2026 — the line continuesSee what it became
Beirut, 1989. Nemr co-founded Sheish Beish — the Arab world's first adult-comic magazine — and drew its lead character, the Lebanese folk hero Abu al Abed. In 1997 his caricature ran in An-Nahar, the paper of Pierre Sadek.
The drawing paid its way: storyboards for Kellogg's, Pampers, Pepsi, and Toyota. In 2011 he founded InDesign, a Dubai interior practice — 750 projects and counting — which is why, when a face needs to become a table, he knows how to build it.
Since 2020 he turns the caricaturist's eye on the city itself. A patched wall, a manhole cover, a kerb cracked into a grin — “It's not what you're looking at, it's what you see.” He still teaches, still runs drawing challenges, still sits at the loud end of the table.
Play. Draw. Doodle. Imagine. Laugh. Be happy. Be alive. Be +.
Cartoons, storyboards, and campaigns — 1989 to now.
The street draws a face. He marks it, photographs it, leaves it there.
Where it all started, 1989. Pencil, acrylic, digital.
Paper, glass eyes, canvas. Built up in layers.
Concrete fragments and rusted rebar, assembled into sculpture.
Furniture with a face. Drawn first, then built — to order.