“Twenty-five years is a long time. So much has happened,” Stefania Angarano sighs. The Italian connoisseur has been running the contemporary art gallery Mashrabia in Downtown Cairo for two and a half decades. In an interview to celebrate the gallery’s birthday, she reminisces open-heartedly about the Middle Eastern art scene, gallery practices, the challenges faced over the years, and the memories made. In 1990, Stefania Angarano embarked on a trip to Cairo as an Arabic student on a grant. Backed with a degree in aesthetics and working experience at galleries in Italy, she stumbled upon Mashrabia Gallery by chance. One thing led to another, and 25 years later, she still is the owner and curator of this Downtown contemporary art hub, which was originally established in the 1970s. “Mashrabia started mainly from the wish to create a bridge between Europe, the West, and Egypt. It was before the internet and before the communication possibilities we have today. It was about introducing international artists to the Egyptian audience,” Angarano says. “Mostly international artists would exhibit at the gallery, because in my opinion, Egyptian artists were very isolated and they were not…
