Gypsum Gallery

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Gypsum Gallery

Gypsum is an international contemporary art gallery established in Cairo in 2013. Gypsum is founded by Aleya Hamza, an independent curator based in Cairo.

Gypsum Gallery is committed to presenting an international, cross-disciplinary program of solo and group exhibitions, publications, limited artist editions and occasional off-site interventions. Eight artists living and working between Alexandria, Amman, Basel, Beirut, Berlin, Cairo and Tehran are represented by the gallery including Doa Aly, Mahmoud Khaled, Maha Maamoun, Basim Magdy, Mona Marzouk, Tamara Al-Samarraei , Setareh Shahbazi and Ala Younis. We are dedicated to forging longstanding relationships with artists, whose rigorous and singular art practice varies in medium, form and approach. Since completing her MA in History of Art at Goldsmiths College in 2001, she has lectured in contemporary art at the American University in Cairo, and worked as a curator at Townhouse Gallery and the Contemporary Image Collective in Cairo. Her projects and exhibitions have been featured internationally in Alexandria, Amsterdam Beirut, Berlin, Bonn, Budapest, Cairo, London, Odense and Rabat. She co-curated the third and fourth editions of PhotoCairo, and her most recent exhibition was on show at the Tate Modern in London in 2012/2013. Gypsum is based in a 1940’s converted residential apartment in the neighbourhood of Zamalek, Cairo. Official opening is on the 29th of October in 2013 with a solo show of recent work by Setarah Shahbazi.

27/09/2026

🌷BOOK LAUNCH & OUTDOOR SCREENING | REPLAY #3

Join us this Tuesday, 29 September, from 8–10pm for the launch of Basim Magdy’s recently self-published book.

Basim Magdy and Engy Aly will discuss Magdy’s book “13 Essential Rules for Understanding the World”, which was designed by Aly. Magdy’s film, which carries the same title and was created 15 years prior, will be screened. The screening and conversation will be followed by a book launch.

As part of REPLAY #3, we’re also thrilled to share the latest edition of the series, now available to stream on our website. This edition features Magdy’s most recent film, The Birds Choose the Cards, which explores tourism, war, and sunsets through an observational collage and first-person narration.

Book launch and outdoor film screening: Tuesday, 29 September, 8–10pm

REPLAY #3 is available to stream on our website until 5 October 2026.

13essentialrulesforunderstandingtheworld

20/09/2026

SAVE THE DATE : Upcoming group exhibition 🌟

Join us at Gypsum on 6 October for the opening of our upcoming group show featuring textile work by Rawan Abbas, Aisha Azab, Omar Abd Elbaqi, Marianne Fahmy, Gözde İlkin, and Layla Tag.

More information coming soon!

Rawan Abbas Aisha Azab Omar Abd Elbaky Marianne Fahmy Gözde İlkin laylatag

Image. Aisha Azab, An ode to a foreign tree (detail), 2026, Stitching and wire on fabric, 35 x 63 cm

17/09/2026

✨OPENING TOMORROW : El Marsam: Modern and Contemporary Art from Egypt at the Middle East Institute, Washington, D.C.

Gypsum is pleased to announce the inclusion of artists Lara Baladi, Yasmine El Meleegy, Nada Elkalaawy, Marianne Fahmy, Huda Lutfi, Maha Maamoun, and Mohamed Monaiseer in “El Marsam: Modern and Contemporary Art from Egypt”.

Curated by Heba El Kayal, the exhibition explores the origins and evolution of the Egyptian modern art movement and its enduring influence on contemporary artistic practice in Egypt. It marks one of the first presentations in a U.S. public institution dedicated exclusively to Egyptian modern and contemporary art.

Taking its title from the Arabic word for “studio,” marsam, the exhibition considers the studio as a space of creation, exchange, and intergenerational dialogue.

The show will run from 18 September – 11 December 2026

The MEI Art Gallery 🌟

Yasmine ElMeleegy Marianne Fahmy Mohamed Monaiseer Huda Lutfi Lara Baladi Maha Maamoun Nada Elkalaawy

Image 1. Huda Lutfi, The Knot
Image 2. Marianne Fahmy, Upon the Margins of Dreamland
Image 3. Nada Elkalaawy, The Pelican
Image 4. Lara Baladi, La Mere Noir
Image 5. Maha Maamoun, 2026
Image 6. Yasmine El Meleegy, Chamber of Commerce, Harvest

14/09/2026

One month until Frieze London! 🌟

For our first year in the Main Section, we will be showing a group presentation featuring work by Nada Elkalaawy, Yasmine El Meleegy, Hana El-Sagini, and Huda Lutfi.

Frieze London, 14-18 October 2026, Regent’s Park

See you there!

Yasmine ElMeleegy Nada Elkalaawy Huda Lutfi Hana El-Sagini

Image. Huda Lutfi, Candle Bearers, 2018, Mixed media on paper, 46 x 56 cm

10/09/2026

💫 A STARTLING RUSH :: Hend Samir’s first solo museum show is now open at the Dordrechts Museum.

The survey brings together early paintings alongside the expansive mature works that earned Samir the Royal Award for Modern Painting in 2021, and a group of new canvases ranging from intimate scenes to sweeping vistas, filled with a rhythm of hope and sounds of the future.

On view until 10 January 2027.

Hend Samir 💛💛💛

Image. Hend Samir, Little Musicians, 2023, acrylic on canvas, 206 x 408 cm

03/09/2026

🌟On view: Z for Zarafa, a solo show by Lara Baladi

In “Anatomy of Revolution”, Baladi’s web-based ABC of global protests, the letter Z stands for many words, among them “Zarafa”, the giraffe gifted by Mohamed Ali to King Charles X of France in 1827. Zarafa sparked a cultural frenzy, yet for Baladi her afterlife persists as both a diplomatic relic and a metaphor for displacement and forced migration.

In the show, Baladi reimagines a Cabinet of Curiosities. Sculptures and stamps reflect on Zarafa’s journey from Sudan to Paris, a mythological dragon-shaped pistol recalls a diplomatic gift from Iraq’s President Saddam Hussein to Egypt’s President Hosni Mubarak, and a drawing depicts the construction of the Statue of Liberty, whose design Bartholdi first proposed for Egypt’s Port Said before it was reworked as France’s gift to the United States.

Reactivating a display format dating back to the sixteenth century, Baladi exposes the absurdity of such exchanges, how they remake the act of giving as a form of persuasion and power.

“Z for Zarafa” is on view until 23 September.

The gallery is open Saturday to Wednesday, 12–8pm (closed Thursday and Friday).

—

Lara Baladi

01/09/2026

Last week to catch Gözde İlkin’s work at the 2026 Medina Triennial, All that sustains us, on view until 7 September.

Founded in 2025, the Medina Triennial is a nonprofit presenting a free, village-wide contemporary art exhibition in [location]. This edition is organised by co-artistic directors Kari Conte and Karin Laansoo.

Instead of starting with a blank canvas, İlkin begins with found textiles produced for the home, like tablecloths and bedsheets. By sewing, embroidering, drawing and printing on these fabrics, she brings different subjectivities and textures of social experience into relation with one another.

The Majority of Accent traces her responsiveness to local histories and modes of storytelling. Developed for an exhibition at Lyon’s former centre for railroad maintenance, the work draws on interviews with railroad workers about their memories of the site. Their stories of labour and solidarity are embedded through words in the sound installation and imagistic, quarry-like associations embroidered on the fabric.

Text courtesy of the Medina Triennial. Photos by Mark Thomas Duggan, courtesy of the Medina Triennial.

Gözde İlkin Medina Triennial 🌟

The Majority of Accent was produced and presented as part of the 17th Lyon Biennial in 2024, supported by SAHA Foundation.

25/08/2026

One month left to catch “Z for Zarafa”, a solo show by Lara Baladi❗️

Emerging from “Anatomy of Revolution,” her monumental web-based ABC of global revolts, the exhibition unfolds through a new body of multimedia works spanning tapestry, photography, web-art and sculptural installations.

For the show, gallery’s viewing room has become a classroom-like space. Baladi reworks the indoctrinating language of 1950s Arabic schoolbooks into her own version of an ABC primer, thinking through symbols of nationhood, displacement and revolution.

Visitors are welcome to draw on the galleries walls, a chalkboard for the period of the show.

“Z for Zarafa” is on view until 23 September.

Open Saturday to Wednesday, 12–8pm (closed Thursday and Friday).

Lara Baladi 🌟

13/08/2026

❕UPCOMING | El Marsam: Modern and Contemporary Art from Egypt

We are pleased to announce the participation of Yasmine El Meleegy, Nada Elkalaawy, Marianne Fahmy, Mohamed Monaiseer, Huda Lutfi, Lara Baladi, and Maha Maamoun in “El Marsam: Modern and Contemporary Art from Egypt”, opening at the Middle East Institute in Washington, DC, this September.

Curated by Heba El Kayal (Heba Kayal), the exhibition explores the origins and evolution of the Egyptian modern art movement and its lasting influence on contemporary artistic practice in Egypt and across the Egyptian diaspora.

El Marsam marks one of the first exhibitions in a public institution in the United States dedicated exclusively to Egyptian modern and contemporary art.

September 18 – December 11, 2026
MEI Art Gallery, Washington, DC

The MEI Art Gallery

Yasmine ElMeleegy Marianne Fahmy Mohamed Monaiseer Huda Lutfi Lara Baladi Maha Maamoun Nada Elkalaawy

Address

3 Road 218, Maadi Degla, Maadi
Cairo
11728

Website

http://gypsumgallery.com/

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