It is our great pleasure to welcome you to Cairo for the second edition of the NAAS series of Arab Arthouse Cinema Workshops. The hope is that these brief five days create a space that manifests the potential of our collective strength when we are together in one place, even briefly, with the time and focus to think together through our experiences, stories and hopes.

In our many conversations in preparation for this edition, we've tried to keep in focus the crisis we face in distribution and circulation in the region. Despite the extraordinary success of so many different alternative spaces and initiatives in the region, the search for a model that can support our audiences, our cinemas, our filmmakers and a world of stories, continues. Many of the challenges we face are economic and infrastructural, and we come together at a moment at which many of us have to create the circumstances for an alternative to exist, not just strengthen or maintain something that has been given us to protect. Which is also to say, despite all its difficulties, we believe we are in a moment of great potential.

To help us on the way, we have tried to make sure this workshop keeps in view a strategic focus on building and identifying resources that might strengthen our collective capacity, while respecting the particularity and diversity of our interests and styles. We have a suspicion that most of us are under resourced, and that even though there are no easy solutions, there are still areas in which our work might be made easier or more effective-so our focus can keep moving towards what we care about the most. We also hope to find ways to make our network stronger and find room for collaborations to grow, but we understand that for that to happen we must find areas of mutual interest, not just rely on the idea that it would be nice if people worked together.

We hope in this edition we have created the circumstances for all of us to be surprised and go on a journey we weren't expecting. Our shared problems most likely require shared solutions, and so we hope that in coming together over common ground, what we are unable to find alone can be found through each other.

The programme includes a number of workshops and screenings:

- June 4 to June 8 workshop at Cimatheque

- Screening of The Dupes at Cimatheque (June 3)

-Screening of Early Morrocan Shorts at Cimatheque (June 5)

-Screening of Scenes From Another Century at Zawya (June 6)

-Roundtable discussion in Rawabet (June 7)

Thank you everyone for being here. Panelists and participants, we know how hard it can be to take time out of our already overstretched lives to make such a moment possible, and we truly appreciate the faith you have put in us to make this workshop happen.

Thank you to all our supporters: The Dutch Embassy in Cairo, The British Council, L'Institut Francais, Goethe Institut, Al Mawred, Ford Foundation, and ArteEast

The Workshop Team