Art Moves Africa – Retracing Roots and Tracing New Routes: Mobility and Touring in North Africa

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GENERAL INFORMATION
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Spanning the northeast corner of Africa and
the southwest corner of Asia, Egypt is located
at the nexus of two continents. It is the most
populous country in North Africa and the Arab
world. Egypt’s economy is one of the largest in
the Middle East and is third only to Nigeria and
South Africa in Africa in terms of GDP (IMF, 2018).
The country is a founding member of the Arab
League, the African Union, the United Nations
and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation.
Egypt’s position at the crossroads of
continents, bodies of water and civilizations
has shaped its cultural history. Greek, Roman,
Ottoman, Persian influences have layered its
cultural heritage; Jewish, Christian and Baha’í
religions have all left their imprint as well, in addition
to the dominant Islamic faith established
after the Arab invasions. Nubians and Coptic
Christians remain important minorities today.
Egypt was a British colony from 1882 to 1922, the
only British possession in North Africa.
Full independence came with the revolution
in 1952 and the declaration of the
republic in 1953. Its 20th-century political
history has been marked by instability and
conflict, with successive armed conflicts
with Israel between 1948 and 1973 and
the spread of terrorism in the 1980s, 90s
and 2000s.
Egypt has always been at the
heart of debates on African identity and
history. In 1955, Senegalese historian and
anthropologist Cheikh Ana Diop published
the seminal and highly polemical Nations
nègres et culture, in which he argued that
Egyptian and African civilizations and
cultures should be traced back to a common
“cradle.” Gamal Abdiel Nasser was a
committed supporter of African liberation
movements and is widely recognized as
a major figure of pan-Africanism. Since
the 1970s, Egyptian foreign and cultural
policy have been geared towards the Middle
East and Europe, although overtures
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E
G
Y
P
T
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QUOTE :
« I’m from Egypt
but I want to speak
to the African soul.
I’m so proud to be an
African. I think I will
never end this project.
I’m archiving Africa
through sound and
music. Every time I
start a country, I feel
it’s endless. »
Yara Mekawei
Sound and video artist,
founder of Radio
Submarine,
Cairo
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Country-Specific Information
have been made in recent years, centering in
particular on negotiations over shares of the
Nile river.
Egypt is one of the Arab countries in
which the 2011 uprisings gave way to full-scale
revolution. Eighteen days after protests erupted
on January 25, 2011, then-president Hosni
Mubarak – who had held power since 1981 – resigned.
However, the years since the revolution
have been marked by heavy instability and a
return to authoritarianism since Abdel Fattah
Sisi’s coup in July 2013. Freedom House rates
Egypt as “not free,” signalling persecution of activists,
parties and political movements, pervasive
corruption, unfair elections, military incursion into
political affairs and discrimination against women,
Christians, Shiite Muslims, Nubians and darkskinned
Egyptians, and LGBTQ communities.
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ARTS AND CULTURE SECTOR
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Egypt has historically had a rich and
well-connected arts sector, bolstered by
a strong, well-structured civil society,
a strong media sector and a huge film
and music industry. The cultural sector
is strongly concentrated in Cairo and to
a lesser extent in Alexandria (Fazeulaa,
2018).
There is no clear state monopoly on
culture today, although censorship and
surveillance of cultural actors are major
problems. State budgets have not invested
significant budgets into culture nor has
the government demonstrated the will
to implement an efficient cultural policy.
This dispensation has left space for the
private sector and civil society to flourish.
In 2018, it was estimated that there were
143 cultural organizations in the country
(Fazeulaa, 2018). These are working to fill
the gap left by insufficient cultural policy
and working creatively to survive despite
adverse legal frameworks.