By Giacomo Crescenzi, Egyptian Streets In April 2013 the Egyptian artist Chant Avedissian, 62, set a new record for an auction sale of a living Arab artist. “Icons of the Nile” was sold at a staggering $ 1,565,000 at Sotheby’s contemporary art auction held in Katara cultural village in Doha. If you come across this piece of information you may feel proud to be Egyptian, and you should be. But though this sale is an indicator that the art scene in Egypt is in perfectly good shape, it is unfortunately far from the reality of things. The art scene in Egypt is underdeveloped, fragmented and alien to the majority of its own people. The art market is not easily accessible both for the community of young and talented Egyptian artists who lack empowering opportunities and the Egyptian community at large who sees art as something arcane and confined to galleries and museums where the vast majority of the population is not interested in going or cannot go. For example, do you know that there is a museum of modern Egyptian art in Zamalek? If so, have you ever been there?…
