The Space Between Us: My Journey Through Culture and Creative Resilience

When I think about a cultural programme, I begin by putting myself in the shoes of the people who will experience it. If I were sitting in the audience, how would I receive it? What would it move in me? Would it bring back a memory, give words to a feeling, or invite me to see something differently? I also think about what others might bring into that same space: their experiences, expectations and reasons for being there. Would they feel welcome enough to participate, express something, or return? 

In my Cultural Programming with Impact series, I explore that space between the audience and the experience, where what we present meets what each person carries within them. I consider what we can do as programmers to make room for that encounter, while recognising that its meaning will be personal to each individual. These questions have stayed with me through years of working in the arts. They shape how I programme performances, build projects and understand leadership. A programme begins with an idea, but its meaning develops through the people who encounter it. I keep returning to that relationship, and to the responsibility we carry when we create the conditions for it.

Much of this thinking began in Alexandria, where I spent thirteen years working at Bibliotheca Alexandrina. Working with artists and audiences taught me how many decisions shape a cultural experience. The choice of artist, the timing, the invitation, the space and the way people are welcomed all influence how they participate and what they take away. My work later took me to Abu Dhabi, where I worked across cultural programming, community engagement, education and marketing. Each area offered a different perspective on the relationship between people and cultural experiences. Across these areas, I have continued to explore how we can build programmes that people find meaningful and organisations can sustain.

In 2011, during the Egyptian Revolution, I founded AGORA for Arts and Culture. At a time when public space carried so much emotion and possibility, I wanted to explore what the arts could offer communities that were not used to visiting cultural centres and theatres. Bringing cultural activity into shared spaces made me think more closely about access, self-expression and how people connect through a shared experience. It also raised questions that one festival or one moment of participation could not answer. What happens afterwards? How do we sustain engagement when people’s circumstances remain difficult? How can cultural engagement help communities find the strength to navigate a crisis and emerge stronger from it? These questions stayed with me and eventually shaped my doctoral research.

My PhD at the University of the West of Scotland examined hybrid cultural engagement in the context of crisis, working with young women living in shelters in Alexandria. Through a participatory research process, we explored creative activities delivered both in person and through Basita.live. The work required attention to practical details: materials, access, continuity and the support available to each participant. It also required listening and allowing the women’s experiences to shape the process. I wanted to understand how participation could contribute to resilience and how we might assess that contribution with care. What people make is one part of the experience. Their choices, relationships and understanding of their own abilities are also part of it.

Through this research, I developed my Creative Resilience Framework, drawing on three connected outcomes of resilience: recovery, sustainability, and growth. In everyday terms, I think about how people regain a sense of strength and agency after a setback, how they keep going through ongoing difficulties, and how they discover possibilities for growth. Creative participation can offer ways to express feelings, practise making decisions, connect with others and recognise abilities that have had little opportunity to emerge. These possibilities require sustained engagement and thoughtful facilitation. They also need evidence. My approach combines resilience assessments with participants’ accounts and qualitative observations, helping us understand both the changes we measure and the experiences behind them. I continue to explore how this work can inform programmes for women, children and communities living through crisis.

Basita.live grew from a related concern. When the pandemic interrupted cultural life in 2020, my co-founder and I wanted to help artists, and audiences remain connected. We began building a virtual platform that could help sustain cultural engagement despite physical distance. Since then, the questions have expanded: how can artists reach audiences beyond their immediate geography, how can cultural organisations collaborate, and how can participation become more accessible? Our vision of “A One Global Cultural Sector” expresses the direction we want to work towards. Building Basita has also brought me closer to technology itself. As I become more involved in coding and shaping the platform, I find myself carrying questions from cultural practice into technical decisions. The experience someone has on a screen deserves the same attention we give to their experience in a venue.

Writing has given me another way to examine these connections. My book, “Cultural Programming with Impact,” brings together seven essays from my Reem’s Window series, drawing on practice, research and moments that have stayed with me. Through it, I reflect on participation, connection and our need for self-expression. I wanted to share the thinking that develops while doing the work, including the questions that remain open. Cultural professionals make decisions every day about whose work becomes visible, who feels invited and which experiences receive support. Writing allows me to pause over those decisions and consider what they may mean in someone else’s life.

As a woman working across culture, research and entrepreneurship, I often find myself returning to questions I cannot leave unanswered. I want to understand them, but I also want to do something with what I learn. That has led me to develop programmes, found organisations, undertake research, learn to code and write a book. Through all of this, I want to leave a trace in people’s lives: something they carry with them, something that helps them see a possibility, express themselves or find the strength to move forward. 

I have learned that starting something is only part of the responsibility. We also need to bring people with us, find the resources and build the structures that allow the work to continue. This is how I have come to understand leadership: staying close to the people the work is meant for, listening to those who help shape it, and being willing to rethink our decisions as we learn. 

I am still learning, and I still put myself in the place of the person who will encounter what we create. What might it move in them? What might stay with them afterwards? And what could become possible if we sustain that space long enough for them to make it their own?

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