Bibi Zogbé

Bibi Zogbé (1890 – 1973) was a Lebanese-born painter based in Buenos Aires, Argentina best known for her depiction of wild flora. Nicknamed “La Pintora de Flores,” or “the flower painter” in Spanish, she often painted heavily symbolic still lifes as well as portraits. She traveled widely and painted during trips to Dakar, Beirut, and Paris, as well as exhibited her work in Chile, Brazil, Cuba and the United States. Though she received relatively little recognition during her lifetime, she has begun to receive new attention as a figure in the twentieth-century Arab and Lebanese modernist art movements.

Early life in Lebanon and settlement in Argentina Zogbé was born as Labibé Zogbé in 1890 to a wealthy Lebanese family. She grew up in the small coastal Lebanese town of Sahel Alma. Her father became the ambassador of Lebanon in Argentina, which had welcomed a small but significant population of migrants of Lebanese origin from 1887 onwards. While growing up in Lebanon, Zogbé attended a local Catholic school and later the Sainte Famille College in Beirut, where she received a French education.

In 1906, when Zogbé was sixteen years old, she left Lebanon for a marriage that her parents had arranged for her in Argentina. She married Domingo Samaja, a wealthy Lebanese-Argentinian immigrant. She legally divorced him in the early 1930s and never remarried. Members of this community developed a distinct Lebanese-Argentine cultural identity, even while many retained, like Zogbé, a firm connection to Lebanon. She also exhibited in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and in Uruguay. At the time, Lebanese artwork was heavily influenced by French impressionism, Spanish modernism, and German expressionism. Zogbé drew inspiration from these styles in her oil paintings. She returned to Beirut for an extended stay in 1947, during which time the Lebanese government sponsored articles on three artists including Zogbé,

Zogbé was able to travel frequently because she had resources as well as a lack of family commitments. She did much of her painting while traveling. The time she spent in Dakar inspired paintings such as “A Village in Senegal.” Zogbé has also inspired other artists, such as Swiss-born Lebanese fashion designer Sandra Mansour. In 2022, Mansour incorporated some of her floral patterns in her fashion line, Fleur du Soleil, for H&M.