Noora Elkoussy
North Hollywood, CA
“I call myself a nutritionist, an artist, and a disaster relief professional, and I have my tumor to thank for the first two.”
Born in San Francisco and raised in a creative family, Noora Elkoussy’s Egyptian roots led her to a lifelong love of travel and exploration of 27 countries, including Tunisia, Croatia, Lebanon, Nepal, and Korea. Throughout her journey, Noora devoted both her education and career to disaster relief and non-profit work through her work with the International Medical Corps in Los Angeles, Kosovo, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, and Florida and extending to Syrian refugees through Heartland Alliance International.
While working abroad, Noora began to experience vision problems, first in Tunisia, then worsening in Lebanon. Suddenly, she was in front of an oncologist who informed her of a serious brain tumor, leading to blindness in one eye. In the midst of her dream job, Noora flew back to the U.S. to undergo surgery. However, the surgery did not go as planned and the tumor had to be left in to protect her optic nerve.
Daily life became extremely difficult. Two years later, Noora was still experiencing the worst migraines of her life and severe vision impairment. She explains, the tumor made it very hard to hold onto a job. She tried a couple of part-time jobs, but with frequent hemorrhaging, daily severe migraines, and excessive sleepiness, she was not considered a reliable employee. Ironically, she kept getting rejected for disability.
To cope with daily pain and unemployment, Noora began re-exploring art to find meaning, purpose, and keep busy while bedridden. It was very therapeutic and healing for her. She also began to research her own methods of healing, pursuing a master’s degree in nutrition, to holistically help herself and others with chronic illness and disease.
“When a brain tumor sidelined my career, and all I could do was stay in bed for years of recovery, art gave me an outlet to exercise my creativity and expand my economic and career horizons.”
Noora’s creativity manifests itself in many different ways, from cooking to painting, jewelry making to crafting, as well as designing. Art is her happy place and source of stress relief, especially when her other great love for helping humanity became heavy and complex. Noora appreciates that art is emotionally fulfilling and mentally calming. “It pushes me to always try and learn something new, which ends up being a great hands-on education”, she exclaims.
Noora loves everything about art, from staring at one of her works in progress and seeing something new and unexpected emerge, to marveling at the beauty in something old and dilapidated. While attracted to Impressionism, her natural go-to is Abstract Expressionism and Surrealism. Noora enjoys challenging herself, stepping out of her comfort zone and trying out new artistic styles.
While humanitarians are taught to refrain from photographing refugees to protect them from harm, Noora does snap some photos from her travels that capture the spirit of the space and time she is in. Two of Noora’s photographs from Nepal were exhibited and sold in a gallery in Laguna Beach, California in 2018. The curator described Noora’s work as “National Geographic worthy.” Photography remains a source of inspiration and documentation for her as she moves through life.
Whilst Noora’s tumor may have put a pause on her world travels, she now draws inspiration from color, dreams, moods, pain, and children, and paints them onto her canvases, aiming to turn each piece into “something happy and abstract.” Whether it is with acrylic or watercolor paint, or through photography, Noora fully embraces the freedom and mystery of the unknown because she knows that “illness and disability are not the end of the world; they are an opportunity to start over and begin a new life.”