Curator Heba El Kayal on bringing a century of modern Egyptian art to Washington, DC

🎨 Egyptian artists have been working alongside European and American modernism for nearly a century, but global audiences have rarely seen that history gathered in one room. El Marsam: Modern and Contemporary Art from Egypt opened at the Middle East Institute’s (MEI) art gallery in Washington, DC on 18 September and runs through 11 December — according to MEI, it’s one of the first US gallery exhibitions devoted entirely to modern and contemporary Egyptian art.

The title tracks the movement’s own history. Marsam is Arabic for studio, the word that gradually replaced the French atelier among Egyptian artists after the two were long used interchangeably. Curator Heba El Kayal reads that switch as a shorthand for Egyptian modernism itself, which took from international currents while working through local traditions, subjects, and aesthetics. She also treats the studio as a place where older artists trained younger ones, and the hang follows those lines of influence.

The works on view span painting, sculpture, drawing, photography, and collage, from canvases dated 1937 to pieces made in 2026. Twenty-nine artists are represented. Pioneering modernists Mahmoud Saïd, Inji Efflatoun, Abdel Hadi El Gazzar, and Gazbia Sirry, among others, hang near Hassan Soliman and his former student Samir Fouad, whose works sit side by side. The contemporary end includes photographer Youssef Nabil, Huda Lutfi, Lara Baladi, and Yasmine El Meleegy, who built a mural from porcelain made at an Egyptian factory, and more.

Most of the works are on loan from private Egyptian collectors, galleries, and the American University in Cairo. Naguib Sawiris put up the lead funding and lent pieces from his own collection, with Hassan Allam and David and Gretchen Welch among the major funders. That backing lands in a market El Kayal calls undervalued: Egyptian moderns still draw less money and attention than their French and American peers, and most buyers are Egyptian and Gulf collectors, she tells us.

Less than a month following its opening, EnterpriseAM caught up with exhibition curator Heba El Kayal (LinkedIn) to discuss El Marsam, how it came to be, what impact it seeks to have, and where Egyptian art stands globally today. Edited excerpts from our conversation:

EnterpriseAM: When did you settle on El Marsam as the title?

Heba El Kayal: The mandate was an exhibition introducing an American audience to modern and contemporary Egyptian art. The title of El Marsam came together when I was thinking about the works that I was going to include and how I was going to tie them in together, because an overview of a type of art, genre of art, or history of art is very broad.

I started asking collectors about the works that they have and what they’d be willing to lend. One work that was shared and offered to be loaned to me showed an aerial view of a number of artists in a massive studio, sectioned off, with different artists sitting at different easels and working. It got me thinking about how the studio is really a site of gathering, learning, exchange, and mentorship by older artists and younger artists. I decided to call it El Marsam because it would allow me to include different works and start to pull in the relationships between artists — whether they were literal relationships or a thread of artists who had informed or influenced others.

For example, I wanted to make sure that I included Mahmoud Saïd, seeing as he had a great influence on many artists that came after him. I wanted to include Hassan Soliman because he had taught artists such as Samir Fouad, and so I included both Soliman and Fouad and even hung them side-by-side in the exhibition. Then there were examples such as Yasmine El Meleegy, who works with porcelain — made by Fathy Mahmoud. Mahmoud was an industrialist who had been commissioned to produce big pieces for government offices. El Meleegy paid homage to him by using ceramicware from the factory and creating a mural, referencing one of the artworks that he had done.

E: You studied English and Comparative Literature at AUC before art history at Columbia. What pulled you from literature to art?

HK: I did study some art history at AUC; I took what I could, and I think if there had been a full art history major, I would have studied that along with English and Comparative Literature. Upon graduating, I started working as a journalist, and I wrote a lot on the art developments that were taking place in Egypt at the time. I reviewed exhibitions, interviewed artists, and went to their studios.

What really caused me to transition from literature to art history was recognizing, during the Arab Spring, that a lot of what had taken place was prophesied by the artwork that I was seeing before the Arab Spring. Samir Fouad had an exhibition two months before 25 January, which offered commentary on what had happened to the Iraqi prisoners in Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. It depicted figures staring out at windows with cow carcasses hanging overhead — It was an interesting commentary on the strangeness, the violence, and the repression that was prevalent in the region.

There was something about it that was so prophetic about what was to come, the violence that was to erupt. It made me recognize the power of art as a medium and as a tool for expression, debate, and activism. That’s the reason why I shifted, because it allowed me to tell stories and understand things in a very relevant, contemporary way.

E: What principle decided what made the wall?

HK: How I went about the exhibition is that I had a list of people that I wanted to include; people that were influential in the order of Egyptian art history; who catalyzed movements. It was really important for me to try to tell as cohesive a story about modern and contemporary Egyptian art as possible. It’s by no means exhaustive, but it’s an attempt to really showcase the breadth of Egyptian art history.

I struggled with having people agree to lend works for a period of time. It sometimes happens where, sadly, an exhibition does not get to include somebody because of reasons as banal as logistics. We were lucky to get the works that we did, and if I was to expand the exhibition, I would try to include more artists, but also several examples of works by each of these artists so I could show again just how expansive their practice has been. All of these people that have been selected, all of these artists that have works on the wall, are people who have done an incredible amount of work and are known for various series.

Every work had something very strongly related to identity, to an Egyptian identity, to being Egyptian, to being of Egypt, and to being from Egypt. I think that’s why many of these works, despite being so different, all hang together quite well. There are very different works up there, from paintings as early as 1937 to photography and collage work as recent as 2025 and 2026.

E: What did you want El Marsam to do differently, especially for a US audience?

HK: I wanted El Marsam to upend people’s understandings and assumptions about what the Middle East is, what Egypt is, and what art in Egypt is like. I wanted to show just how talented, capable, and incredible the work produced by Egyptian artists over the decades is, and show a US audience not only the extensive history of Egyptian art, but the high level of skill and talent that is to be found in Egypt.

E: Several weeks in, who is mostly coming through the door? Is there a question American visitors kept asking you?

HK: People who are mostly coming through the door are a lot of visitors and guests to the Middle East Institute, which hosts guests regularly for different events, roundtable discussions, and people from the government. There are also a lot of members of the diaspora, people who have heard about this exhibition, and Americans living in DC. The American audience so far has been very impressed and really taken by what they’ve seen. I feel very lucky that we’ve been able to have that kind of an impact. It’s generated a lot of questions and thoughts pertaining to people’s understanding of Egypt.

E: Measured against other moderns, where do Egyptian moderns sit in the market? Are they undervalued?

HK: Yes, Egyptian moderns are undervalued globally. They don’t fetch or even receive the attention that French modernists or American modernists are currently achieving in the market, because Egyptian art is known, but it’s not the most known nor the most understood.

Academics have to contextualize these artists and these works in research papers, conferences, and texts. Curators have to do their utmost effort to learn about these artists and incorporate them in exhibitions. Collectors and patrons have to be generous and lend these works when asked of them so that these works can travel, be seen by different audiences, and audiences can learn about them. Egyptian modern art is actually quite special and quite beautiful, and it does not sit where I believe it can and where it should, but I believe that the kind of work that one does will help to get it there eventually.

E: Who is buying Egyptian art now? Egyptian collectors, Gulf buyers, or Western institutions?

HK: People who are collecting Egyptian art now tend to be Egyptian collectors and people from the Middle East and the Gulf. Western institutions have started to collect some of the modernists and some contemporary artists, and I think that it’s been wonderful to have that happen. But it is still an underdeveloped market. The more interest there is in Egyptian art, the more buyers there become, the bigger the market becomes, and the more it expands. It’s a gradual matter, but I think it will happen with time.