Many of Egypt’s revolutionary activists claim that the 2011 uprisings were not simply about former President Hosni Mubarak.
They were about placing power and resources in all spheres in the hands of the public. In the cultural sphere, art is a contested domain.
In Egypt, official institutions – government and private, domestic and foreign – play an acute role in the arts by virtue of their positions as the funders, promoters, critics, and censors of art.
These institutions have the ability to select, feature, explain, and thus, determine the legitimacy, value and utility of art.
What constitutes real art, real artists, and valid analyses of that art is up to these institutions – giving them extensive power.