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So when I decided to create
an art piece in Manshiyat Naser,

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the neighborhood of the Cairo
garbage collectors in Egypt,

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I never thought this project would be

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the most amazing human experience
that I would ever live.

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As an artist, I had
this humanist intention

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of beautifying a poor
and neglected neighborhood

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by bringing art to it and hopefully
shining light on this isolated community.

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The first time I heard about
this Christian Coptic community

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was in 2009 when the Egyptian authorities
under the regime of Hosni Mubarak

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decided to slaughter 300,000 pigs
using the pretext of H1N1 virus.

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Originally, they are pig breeders.

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Their pigs and other animals
are fed with the organic waste

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that they collect on a daily basis.

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This event killed their livelihood.

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The first time I entered Manshiyat Naser,
it felt like a maze.

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I was looking for the St. Simon Monastery
on the top of the Muqattam Mountain.

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So you go right, then straight,
then right again, then left

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to reach all the way to the top.

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But to reach there, you must dodge between
the trucks overpacked with garbage

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and slalom between the tuk-tuks,

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the fastest vehicle to move around
in the neighborhood.

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The smell of the garbage
unloaded from those trucks was intense,

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and the noise of the traffic
was loud and overbearing.

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Add to it the din created by the crushers
in those warehouses along the way.

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From outside it looks chaotic,
but everything is perfectly organized.

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The Zaraeeb, that’s how
they call themselves,

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which means the pig breeders,

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have been collecting the garbage of Cairo

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and sorting it in their own
neighborhood for decades.

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They have developed
one of the most efficient

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and highly profitable systems
on a global level.

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Still, the place is perceived
as dirty, marginalized and segregated

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because of their association
with the trash.

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So my initial idea
was to create an anamorphic piece,

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a piece that you can only see
from one vantage point.

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I wanted to challenge myself artistically
by painting over several buildings

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and having it only fully visible
from one point on the Muqattam Mountain.

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The Muqattam Mountain
is the pride of the community.

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This is where they built
the St. Simon Monastery,

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a 10,000-seat cave church
that they carved into the mountain itself.

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So, the first time
I stood on top of the mountain

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and I looked at the neighborhood,

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I asked myself, how on earth
will I convince all those owners

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to let me paint on their buildings?

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And then Magd came.

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Magd is a guide from the Church.

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He told me the only person I needed
to convince was Father Samaan,

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who is the leader of the community.

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But to convince Father Samaan,
I needed to convince Mario,

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who is a Polish artist
who moved to Cairo 20 years ago

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and who created all the artwork
of the Cave Church.

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I am really grateful to Mario.
He was the key of the project.

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He managed to get me
a meeting with Father Samaan,

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and surprisingly, he loved the idea.

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He asked me about where I painted before

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and how I will make it happen.

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And he was mainly concerned
by what I was going to write.

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In every work that I create,
I write messages

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with my style of Arabic calligraphy.

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I make sure those messages are relevant
to the place where I am painting

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but have this universal dimension,

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so anybody around the world
can relate to it.

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So for Manshiyat Naser,

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I decided to write in Arabic
the words of St. Athanasius of Alexandria,

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a Coptic bishop from the third century,

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who said: (Arabic),

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which means in English,

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"Anyone who wants
to see the sunlight clearly

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needs to wipe his eyes first."

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It was really important for me

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that the community
felt connected to the words.

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And for me this quote was perfectly
reflecting the spirit of the project.

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So Father Samaan blessed the project,

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and his approval brought
all the residents on board.

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Hundreds of liters of paint,
a dozen blue manual lifts,

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several trips back and forth to Cairo,

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a strong and solid team from France,
North Africa, Middle East and the US,

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and after a year of planning
and logistics, there we are,

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my team and some members
from the local community

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creating a piece that will
spread over 50 buildings,

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some filling up the space
of the calligraphy

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that I trace with colors.

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Here some blue, there some yellow,
there some orange.

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Some others carrying some sand bags

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and putting them
on the top of the buildings

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to hold those manual lifts,

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and some others assembling
and disassembling those same lifts

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and moving them around
the different buildings.

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At the beginning of the project,

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I numbered all those
buildings on my sketch,

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and there was no real interaction
with the community.

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People didn’t get the point of all this.

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But fast enough, those building numbers
became family names.

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The first building
was the house of Uncle Ibrahim.

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Uncle Ibrahim is such
an enthusiastic person.

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He was always singing and making jokes,

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and his daughters and sons
saved me from his bull

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who wanted to attack me
on the fourth floor.

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(Laughter)

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Actually, the bull saw me from the window
and came out on the balcony.

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(Laughter)

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Yeah.

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Uncle Ibrahim was always
hanging out on the balcony

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and talking to me while I was painting.

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I remember him saying that he didn’t
go to the mountain for 10 years,

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and that he never takes a day off.

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He said that if he stopped working,
who will stop the garbage?

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But surprisingly,
at the end of the project,

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he came all the way to the mountain
to look at the piece.

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He was really proud
to see his house painted,

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and he said that this project
was a project of peace and --

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sorry --

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(Applause)

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Thank you.

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He said that it was a project
of peace and unity

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and that it brought people together.

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So his perception
towards the project changed,

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and my perception towards
the community changed also,

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and towards what they do.

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All the garbage that everybody
is disgusted by is not theirs.

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They just work out of it.

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Actually, they don’t live in the garbage.
They live from the garbage.

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So I started doubting myself and wondering

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what was the real purpose
of this whole project?

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It was not about beautifying
a place by bringing art to it.

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It was about switching perception
and opening a dialogue

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on the connection that we have
with communities that we don’t know.

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So day after day,

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the calligraphy circle was taking shape,

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and we were always excited to go back
on the mountain to look at the piece.

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And standing exactly at this point
every day made my realize

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the symbolism behind
this anamorphic piece.

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If you want to see
the real image of somebody,

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maybe you should change your angle.

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There was doubts and difficulties,

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like fears and stress.

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It wasn't simple
to work in such environments,

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sometimes having pigs under you
while you paint

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or climbing a stack of garbage
to reach a lift.

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But we all got over the fear
of the heights, the swinging lifts,

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the strength of the smell

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and also the stress
of not finishing on time.

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But the kindness of all those people
made us forget everything.

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The building number 3 was the house
of Uncle Bakheet and Aunty Fareeda.

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In Egyptian, they have
this expression that says, "Ahsen Nas,"

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which means "the best people."

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They were the best people.

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We used to take our break
in front of their houses,

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and all the kids of the neighborhood

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used to join us.

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I was impressed and amazed
by the kids of Manshiyat Naser.

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For the first few days, they were always
refusing anything we were offering them,

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even a snack or a drink.

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So I asked Aunty Fareeda, "Why is that?"

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And she told me they teach
their kids to refuse anything

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from somebody that they don't know

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because maybe this person
needs it more than they do.

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So at this exact point I realized actually

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the Zaraeeb community
was the ideal context

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to raise the topic of perception.

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We need to question
our level of misconception

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and judgment we can have as a society

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upon communities
based on their differences.

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I remember how we got delayed
on Uncle Ibrahim's house

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when his pigs that are bred on the rooftop

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were eating the sand bags
that hold the lifts.

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(Laughter)

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The house of Uncle Bakheet
and Aunty Fareeda

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was this kind of meeting point.

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Everybody used to gather there.

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I think this is what Uncle Ibrahim meant

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when he said that was
a project of peace and unity,

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because I really felt
that people were coming together.

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Everyone was greeting us
with a smile, offering us a drink

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or inviting us into their
own house for lunch.

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Sometime, you are
at the first level of a building,

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and somebody opens his window
and offers you some tea.

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And then the same thing happens
on the second floor.

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And you keep going all the way to the top.

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(Laughter)

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(Applause)

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I think I never drink as much tea
as I did in Egypt.

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(Laughter)

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And to be honest with you,
we could have finished earlier,

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but I think it took us three weeks
because of all those tea breaks.

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(Laughter)

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In Egypt, they have another expression,
which is "Nawartouna,"

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which means, "You brought light to us."

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In Manshiyat Naser
they were always telling us this.

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The calligraphy, actually --

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I used a white glow-in-the-dark paint
for the calligraphy

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so at the end of the project,
we rented some black light projectors

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and lit up the whole neighborhood,

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surprising everybody around.

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We wanted to tell them

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that they are the ones
who brought light to us.

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(Applause)

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The Zaraeeb community
are strong, honest, hard workers,

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and they know their value.

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The people of Cairo
call them "the Zabaleen,"

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which means "the people of the garbage,"

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but ironically,
the people of Manshiyat Naser

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call the people of Cairo the Zabaleen.

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They say, they are the ones
who produce the garbage, not them.

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(Laughter)

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(Applause)

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The goal was to leave something
to this community,

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but I feel that they are the ones
who left something in our lives.

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You know, the art project
was just a pretext

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for this amazing human experience.

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The art piece at some point
will disappear, vanish,

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and actually there is somebody
who is building a second floor

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in front of Uncle Ibrahim's house,

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so it's covering part of the painting,

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so I might need to go back
and paint over it.

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(Laughter)

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It was about the experience,

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about the story,

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about the moment.

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From the streets of the neighborhood,

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the painting appears in fragments,

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isolated from one another,

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standing alone.

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But connected with the sign of calligraphy

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that today reveals the powerful message
that we should all think about

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before we want to judge somebody.

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Anyone who wants to see
the sunlight clearly

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needs to wipe his eyes first.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)