Medrar sets the stage for artists seeking to have extensive conversations and collaborations with their peers to develop their purpose as active contemporary artists thus creating a more dynamic and inspired movement. By tapping into this existing collective intelligence, Medrar encourages cooperation, over competition, among artists, locally and internationally, as well as between institutions, critics, and technologists to engage and experiment in this rich playground of media arts. This is achieved through hosting festivals, workshops, and events to stimulate the scene; providing a collaborative space for media artists; documenting and disseminating audio-visual content on the contemporary art movement in Egypt.

When it started as a collective in 2005, Medrar mediated gaps between different avenues for visual art in Egypt; Institutional structures, State-run competitions, Galleries maintaining a classic postcolonial Art market, and a growing scene of Contemporary Practices mostly linking to Euro-American domains. Emerging Egyptian artists infused Medrar’s identity with a strong focus on new media/digital experiments with moving images, leading to its establishment as an independent Artist-run venue by 2012. Alongside collaborations and showcasing of initiatives, Medrar organizes several annual programs; Namely the Cairo Video Festival, Roznama, The Interaction & Media Lab, and the documentary channel - Medrar TV
The MedrarTV project team has been actively filming the past 14 years of life around Contemporary Arts in Cairo and other capitals of the Arab world. The online - Brief report format - episodes cover events, openings, studio visits and artist interviews. Apart from the published 240 videos, the project has built over time a significant library of original footage with hopes to preserve and narrate this history.
We invite you to visit our station at Supermarket and experience a free browsing session through our collective archive. Guided by Dia Hamed - a founding member of Medrar, the walkthrough proposes conversations around personal & institutional archiving practices, notions of Open Source Cultural Heritage and absence of reference in an age of digital museums.