What’s Your Favorite…?

The idea of this formula is to gather practitioners of various artistic disciplines (writers, musicians, curators, artists…) to respond to a question that reads very simple at first glance, and that relates to popular culture as much as to other areas of knowledge. Participants have responded with storytelling, reading, theatre, image, video, and sound.

June 14, 2018: What’s Your Favorite Ending? at Museo Tamayo in Mexico City

On the occasion of Orbitals, Mophradat and Museo Tamayo hosted an evening titled What’s Your Favorite Ending? Part of an ongoing series of events Mophradat has previously organized in Brussels and in Cairo, the evening asks invited artists and curators to respond to the given question in whatever format they choose. The event includes responses by Orbitals participants Alia B. Al-Sabi, Hicham Bouzid, Kamila Metwaly, and Ahmed Refaat, and they are joined by artists Miguel Calderón and Ana Gallardo.

Alia B. Al-Sabi is a Palestinian writer and researcher, and currently a Helena Rubenstein Critical Studies Fellow at the Whitney Independent Study Program in New York.

Hicham Bouzid is a Moroccan curator and artistic director of Think Tanger and Atelier Kissaria in Tangier.

Miguel Calderón is a Mexican artist working in a variety of media to reconfigure a dark sense of humor through exploration of different social territories.

Ana Gallardo is a self-taught Argentinian artist living between Buenos Aires and Mexico City, whose work proposes art as a space of reflection and transformation.

Kamila Metwaly is an Egyptian-Polish music journalist, electronic musician, and curator living between Cairo and Berlin.

Ahmed Refaat is an Egyptian researcher and film programmer at the Contemporary Image Collective (CiC) in Cairo.

  • February 21, 2018: What’s Your Favorite Sound? at Mophradat’s office in Brussels

Mophradat collaborates with curator Aram Moshayedi on an evening in which artists respond to the question: “What’s Your Favorite Sound?” with Manon de Boer, gerlach en koop, Kamila Metwaly, Diederik Peeters, Reem Shilleh, and a backdrop by Mounira Al Solh. During the event, Moshayedi will introduce some of his projects involving artists’ music, and Mophradat will present a newly released vinyl record by The Dwarfs of East Agouza (Mophradat/Unrock 2017). Drinks will be served.

Manon de Boer is an artist primarily working with film, living in Brussels.

gerlach en koop have been working as a collective artist since 2000.

Kamila Metwaly is a music journalist, electronic musician, and curator living between Cairo and Berlin.

Aram Moshayedi is curator at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles.

Diederik Peeters is a licensed visual artist accidentally lost in the stables of performing arts.

Reem Shilleh is a filmmaker and, with Mohanad Yaqubi, part of Subversive Film.

Mounira Al Solh is a Lebanese-Dutch visual artist.

This event was organized in collaboration with Flanders Arts Institute on the occasion of Aram Moshayedi’s participation in its Visitors’ Programme. With thanks to Beursschouwburg.

  • December 20, 2017: Record launch and party at Underground Club in Cairo

A party to launch a brand new vinyl LP by The Dwarfs of East Agouza (Alan Bishop, Maurice Louca, Sam Shalabi) recorded live as part of Both Sides of the Curtain in Beirut, produced in collaboration with UnRock, and with special cover art by Mariana Castillo Deball. Celebratory DJ sets by Bishop, Maxton Fort, and Mister EZ.

  • December 20, 2017: What’s Your Favorite Tool? at CiC in Cairo

To mark the publication of the book of interviews, These are the Tools of the Present: Cairo — Beirut (Mophradat/Sternberg), responses were invited to the question:“What’s Your Favorite Tool?” from novelist, translator, and editor Nael Eltoukhy, filmmaker Nadine Khan, political ecologist and environmental educator Pam Labib, and curator and writer Francis McKee, against a backdrop by Nile Sunset Annex.

Nael Eltoukhy’s novel Women of Karantina (Merit/AUC Press) was published in 2013, and Out of the Gutter is forthcoming from Al-Karma. He translates from Hebrew to Arabic, most recently Almog Behar’s novel Chahla and Hezkial (Kotob Khan, 2016). He is currently opinion editor at Mada Masr.

Nadine Khan is a filmmaker (including One in a Million, 2006, and Harag w Marag, 2012) and a television director (Sab3 Gar, 2017) living and working in Cairo.

Pam Labib is “mad” by genes, political ecologist by training, environmental educator by accident, and anarchist feminist by practice: “I live in a world of make believe that I don’t make; in a world that hates who and how I love, all while its ecological stable states are falling apart.”

Francis McKee is an Irish writer and curator. He is director of CCA Glasgow and a lecturer and research fellow at Glasgow School of Arts, working on the development of open source ideologies and their practical application.

  • December 19, 2017: What’s Your Favorite Conspiracy Theory? at CiC in Cairo

As a tribute to Francis McKee’s book How to Know What’s Really Happening (Kayfa Ta/Mophradat), responses were invited to the question: “What’s Your Favorite Conspiracy Theory?” from filmmaker, curator, and writer Alia Ayman, artist Rana ElNemr, sound artist Yara Mekawei, and curator and writer Francis McKee, in the presence of a painting by Mona Marzouk.

Alia Ayman occasionally makes films/videos, often curates (mostly at Zawya), and sometimes works on a mysterious dissertation for her PhD in anthropology at New York University.

Rana ElNemr is an artist who works primarily with photography, but also engages text, film, sound, and sculpture. She is a cofounder of the Contemporary Image Collective.

Yara Mekawei is a Cairo-based electro-acoustic music composer and sound artist. Her sonic bricolages draw inspiration from the flow and infrastructure of urban centers.

  • December 18, 2017: Andeel’s Next Floor at the Windsor Hotel’s Barrel Bar in Cairo

Andeel read his new short story commissioned by Mophradat. Next Floor is about the decisive moment in which a five-year-old’s school adventures confront him with his own consciousness and emotions. Getting to grips with the existence of the other, he wonders if we are the subjects of a strictly controlled experiment.

Andeel is a cartoonist, writer of articles, scriptwriter, artist, and actor. He has been working in journalism, cinema, and the internet since 2005.

  • October 4, 2017: What’s Your Favorite Tool? at Bureau des Réalités in Brussels

To mark the publication of Mophradat’s book of interviews, These are the Tools of the Present, with Bureau des Réalités we invite you to an evening during which artists Chris Evans, Jasmina Metwaly, and Sophie Nys will each present their favorite tool against a backdrop designed by Nile Sunset Annex, and accompanied by Marnie Slater reading a text written by Mirene Arsanios.

  • February 20, 2017: What’s Your Favorite Conspiracy Theory? at Buenos Tiempos, Int. in Brussels

Organized at the occasion of the launch of the book How to Know What’s Really Happening by Francis McKee, a co-publication with Kayfa ta, What’s Your Favorite Conspiracy Theory? was an evening of conspiracies with McKee, Sven Augustijnen, Eleanor Ivory Weber, and Geo Wyeth, hosted within a scenography designed in collaboration with Laurie Charles.