Egypt: Art takes centre stage for months

If the Egyptian revolution has affected the economy, a lot of local artists are benefitting from it because it has helped to expose their works. Art forms as graffiti have now moved from the status of vandalism to a newly-appreciated form of visual art.
Mashrou3 Hagar or Hagar’s project is helping them to express themselves through their works by providing much needed materials beyond their reach. In collaboration with Darb 1718 and the European Union this year, discussions and training workshops will be held for local artists with the ambition of producing diverse artworks which will be later go on exhibitions in Alexandria, Aswan and Cairo. They will be concerned with Egyptian women and the expression of related issues through art.
The exhibitions in these major towns and in the capital will be commencing this November and end in February of next year. It will begin its long journey in Alexandria on 29th November until 14 December, before Aswan takes it turn from the 18th to the 30th of December and will finally be on display in Cairo from 9 to 25 February 2013.
The project has been focusing on young and emerging artists and concentrated more on video art, photography, graphic design and street art. It is driven towards making artists ask why art empowers and provide technical training.
During June and July of 2012, European artists and curators like Mawa Zoller, Caram Kapp, Sara-Dunna Meyer, Andrien Sina and Marianne Hultman gave trainings and workshops to Egyptian artists as part of cultural exchange and the works will be part at the exhibitions. Several Egyptian NGOs shared their expertise on women with the artists.
Since the end of the revolution, art has become a popular expression tool.