Personal Life
In 1999, Atlas married Syrian kanun player Abdullah Chhadeh. The couple divorced in 2005. Atlas is now in a relationship with British Egyptian violinist Samy Bishai. The couple divide their time between London and France.
Atlas has said in the past that she is "technically Muslim" and that she identifies with Sufism, but says that "these days I prefer to say that I'm Anglo-Middle Eastern and leave the religion out of it." She is, however, open to other forms of spirituality because "it's important to be tolerant".
In 2001, she was appointed by Mary Robinson as a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Conference Against Racism. Robinson chose Atlas because "she embodies the message that there is a strength in diversity. That our differences – be they ethnic, racial or religious – are a source of riches to be embraced rather than feared".
Atlas is a proponent of The Zeitgeist Movement. She included clips from Zeitgeist: Addendum in her 2010 album Mounqaliba.
Read more about this topic: Natacha Atlas
Famous quotes containing the words personal and/or life:
“In the weakness of one kind of authority, and in the fluctuation of all, the officers of an army will remain for some time mutinous and full of faction, until some popular general, who understands the art of conciliating the soldiery, and who possesses the true spirit of command, shall draw the eyes of all men upon himself. Armies will obey him on his personal account. There is no other way of securing military obedience in this state of things.”
—Edmund Burke (1729–1797)
“There is something servile in the habit of seeking after a law which we may obey. We may study the laws of matter at and for our convenience, but a successful life knows no law.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)