06.26.2014
Nada Deyaa watches change happen at the Oyoun Art Group

“We were born to give and to bring about change. What’s the point of living otherwise,” asks Nader Adel, one of the founders of the Oyoun Art Group, a group of young people determined to change the country’s cultural life by themselves.

It’s no secret that most of Egypt’s cultural hubs are centralised in Cairo and Alexandria, as well as youth activities. As a result, a group of young Egyptians living in the Upper Egyptian governorate of Minya decided to try to shake things up and break the Cairo monopoly over the arts.

In 2002, they teamed up with local NGOs to conduct workshops on how to use the arts to support local communities. In 2011, the Oyoun Art Group, a limited company, was formed.

The Group aims to provide a safe and free space for young people to express their ideas, beliefs and interests, as well as to empower them in ways of expressing themselves that require technical support and other tools to turn those dreams into reality.

It started in villages in Minya by making films. “We discovered that many of the best ideas and stories come out of young brilliant minds in such places that only need a space for such ideas to emerge,” Adel commented.

Not only does the group talk to students about their movie ideas, but it also helps them to make them using simple technology and allowing the students to direct the films themselves. “We teach them how to develop their skills and imagination using the simplest yet funniest ways possible. The results are not up to the level of professional products, but they have a real sincerity and directness about them,” he says.

“Some of the most brilliant animated movies supported by the group have come from uneducated kids we visited at an educational institution,” Adel continued, describing how education in this case meant more than simply being able to read and write.

The group has worked on UN projects, and in 2012 it was picked by Yahoo as one of the best nine youth initiatives in the Arab world. “It was then that we felt the urge to take the project to the next level and have our own place to teach and communicate with people,” Adel said, adding that they had made applications in this direction to the European Union.

The applications were successful, and with EU help the group was able to open premises it calls Your Own Space.

Sessions at the premises are often on photography, film-making, shadow theatre, one-minute videos, or other art forms the people ask about. The group also has an Open Mic Day, when speakers are given five minutes to express themselves in any way they choose.

“We were astonished at the ways people opened up in public, with some choosing to sing, others to recite poetry, and still others to play their favourite musical instruments,” Adel concluded.