Tarek Ali Hassan
Tarek Ali Hassan, is a professor of medicine and chief of endocrinology at Al-Azhar University in Cairo. He is also a composer, musician, writer, painter, and philosopher. His music, in a modern polyphonic style, has been performed in Egypt and in many countries.
Hassan has published major dramatic works in English and in Arabic.
He is chairman of the Zenab Kamel Hassan Foundation for Holistic Human Development, which works on human development and empowerment issues in the Imbaba district of Cairo.
Tarek Hassan's philosophy involves "a deep belief in that human beings are a unique evolutionary breakthrough."
He is a critic of "static models in science, and in the humanities". To him, "the model of Homo sapiens sapiens is not Achilles or Agamemnon but Osiris, Mozart, and Gandhi."
He believes that "survival and thriving by creativity is a major unique human breakthrough which is destroyed by violence."
Some of Hassan's musical works have become repertoire at the Cairo Opera.
In 1991, he was presented with France's highest arts decoration: he was made a Commander in the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, the highest rank for this award, for "his services to International Culture, drama and International communication and violence-resolution.
