She is modest, practical, and art-loving. These are my first impressions of Zeinab Khalifa, one of Egypt’s pioneering jewellery makers, whose extravagant silver and gold pieces grab the admiration of thousands of women inside and outside Egypt. 

I pass by the windows of her shop located in a street parallel to the teeming 26 July Street in Zamalek regularly. When she is there, I find her busy working or surrounded by friends from different walks of life. 

As I enter the store for an interview, she welcomes me kindly with a broad smile, perhaps hiding her unwillingness to talk about personal issues. In her light blue summer dress with its decoration of flowers and her short and curly grey hair she looks like an enthusiastic businesswoman many years younger than her true age.

Many amazing pieces are on show in her store. There is a variety of exhibits ranging from classic to traditional and popular items. Her authentic and glamorous pieces, exhibited elegantly in glass cabinets, are inspired by Islamic, Coptic, and African motifs, reflecting her passion and understanding of different cultures. Many are inspired by plants, fish, and cats, all reflecting a lively vibe.

Some items are inspired by legacy artwork collected by her late friends Reaya Al-Nemr and her husband Abdel-Ghani Abul-Enein, a visual artist and an expert on the popular arts who used to design the costumes of the National Troupe for Popular Arts. 

One of the pieces depicts a dancer holding a stick. It is inspired by her love for the traditional costumes of popular dancers from Upper Egypt and other areas. “I am inspired by our rich legacy of popular culture and our international legacy of the popular arts,”  Khalifa said.

Some of the exhibits are adorned with coloured stones. Her most favoured are earth colours, in addition to shades of blue. “When I touch silver or gold, I immediately feel their originality and flexibility. But silver, due to its neutral colour, obliges me to add more stones in different colours. Creativity in gold jewellery is limited to an extent due to its shine and colour,” she says.

How should we start our talk, I asked, after she had welcomed me with a cup of coffee. She hastened to say that she likes to talk about the silversmith workshops in Al-Sagha, an area in Old Cairo where silver and gold workshops and traders have traditionally been located.

She mentioned the recently increased taxes and the transfer of the hallmark administration from Khan Al-Khalili in Old Cairo to Al-Obour City as two main obstacles towards the improvement of small craftshops in the district. 

“This has opened the door to some cheating. The owners of small workshops are suffering a lot from the recently issued decisions,” Khalifa said. “This has led to the decrease of the number of skilled artisans. Their lack of social insurance is another huge problem.” 

“If the government intends to improve the country’s micro industries, it should apply tax-exemption policies and offer workers good social insurance programmes. I am sure this would change Egypt’s future in a few years. We should also enhance awareness of the environment and benefit from previous experiences in India, Malaysia and Korea,” she added. 

Khalifa was born in 1951 in Attaba, a commercial area in Downtown Cairo. It was there that she was first introduced to different traditional handicrafts and explored the Khedival city. Her family came from the Gharbiya Governorate. Her father was a clothtrader, and her mother was a housewife. In her teenage years, she was surrounded by her father’s workers from Nubia.

“This is why I grew up loving Nubian jewellery,” she said. 

She remembered the Attaba neighbourhood in 1960s as a hub for the arts. “It was a very beautiful place. I enjoyed my childhood there. I went to the American Mission School, which was in the neighbourhood. Like all girls, I loved to play in the street with my friends, but my parents severely punished me for that,” Khalifa said.

 “On Fridays, people from Upper Egypt would perform the tahteeb, a traditional dance with wooden sticks performed while riding horses. Other groups from the Oases and the Red Sea would play music on the nay (flute) and other traditional instruments. Unfortunately, my family left Attaba in 1969 to live in Maadi when social circumstances started to change,” she said. 

FIRST STEPS: In the 1970s, Khalifa took part in protests against the then Al-Sadat regime, and her family convinced her to study in London.

“I was my family’s big headache. They convinced me to travel to London to continue my studies there. I was 20 years old and stayed in London for seven years. I studied economics for a year and then got married to the emerging film director Mohamed Khan. It was hard to find a balance between my family and university study. So, after some years, I opened the Kad Art Gallery in London.”

Before she left for London, Zeinab had graduated from the Philosophy Department of the Faculty of Arts at Ain Shams University in Cairo. She chose to study philosophy to fulfill her desire to know more about Antonio Gramsci, the Italian Marxist philosopher and writer, the French philosopher Jacques Derrida, and the German philosopher Karl Marx. 

“I was overwhelmed by curiosity to study their theories that had changed the world in different ways. Their work paved my path to be a different artist,” she said.

I asked Khalifa how she saw the relationship between philosophy and art. “Philosophy is the origin of all arts. It is a quest for justice and goodness in human beings. It is not just about strict theories. Philosophy is hugely connected to daily life and art,” she said.

She is sociable. She loves to be among people. Over the last three decades, she has developed strong relationships with prominent figures in the Armenian community in Cairo, one of them being Papazian, the owner of a watches store in Attaba. She talks about their relationship with great affection. 

A socialist and a democrat who believes in social justice, Khalifa is an advocate of better living standards for workers, something she must have inherited from her parents. She has introduced important measures in her own workshop, established some 25 years ago, and before that she worked closely with the children of garbage collectors in Cairo, teaching them how to make dolls from plastic and metal leftovers.

In the 1980s, Khalifa studied contemporary sculpture and participated in the visual arts scene by performing experimental installations. These were related to a philosophical or political theme, and one of them criticised the then popular religious preacher Sheikh Al-Shaarawi.

She established the Al-Sohba Group, a film production company, with her late husband the film director Mohamed Khan in 1980 when they returned from London, along with actress Nadia Shukri and film director Atef Al-Tayyeb. Together, they produced some of the most significant films of the time, including The Bus Driver with Nour Al-Sherif in 1982 and The Street Player with Adel Imam in 1983. Both contained social content. 

“Even before I met my husband, I used to love cinema and theatre. A good part of my leisure time has always been and still is spent watching films in theatres,” Khalifa said.

She continued to be involved in the cinema industry in the 1990s and befriended many prominent actors such as Ahmed Zaki, Soad Hosni, Yehia Al-Fakharani and others. As an artist, she contributed to many productions, such as Summer Stealth by director Yousry Nasrallah in 1988 and The Original Ones starring Menna Shalabi in 2017.

JEWELLERY: Khalifa’s philosophy of jewellery is that her pieces should not be simply complementary to a woman’s dress. 

“Jewellery is not just for decoration and shouldn’t be looked at as a piece of ornamentation. It is rather a part of someone’s character and spirit,” she noted. 

She is considered to be a prominent figure in the second generation of modern jewellery makers in Egypt. “The pioneering jewellery maker Azza Fahmy and others preceded me and paved the way for my career and facilitated the way a female artist should handle issues related to artisans and workers,” she said.

“It was hard in the beginning to work in a male-dominated business. But with time, I started to learn from professional artisans and proved my serious intention to present different and quality jewellery that could compete in local and international markets,” she said.

 “I now give free lessons to two or three young artisans, teaching them the craft. My work has also paved the way for a younger generation of female jewellery makers. There are around four female artisans working in jewellery and home decor who have their workshops next to mine in Al-Sagha today,” she said.

“I have learned not to be too emotionally linked with the workers. It is important to respect the space between me and them, and yet to be helpful when they have health or social problems,” she said in a compassionate tone.

After 30 years developing your career as an artist, what has changed for you as a woman, I ask.

“This is a good question,” she smiled. “Actually, one good thing is avoiding glory and being away from social commitments,” she said. “It has made me socially connected with people from different backgrounds. However, unlike installation art, which gives you a space to express your political opinions and causes instant satisfaction, jewellery making is more concerned with beauty and legacy and it takes time to get good feedback.”  

Now in seventies, Khalifa still works hard and does not take long vacations. “I always have a paper and pencil in hand. I do a lot of sketches,” she said.

She has participated in many exhibitions locally and internationally, and she has organised an exhibition at Regis University in the United States. Her latest solo exhibition was in 2016 at her store in Cairo, where she exhibited ten of her most popular pieces depicting images of women in ancient Egyptian art and in modern popular art. 

An avid reader, Khalifa often reads about precious stones and industry issues worldwide. She loves to travel around the country and become inspired by popular art and traditional dances, among other places in Port Said, for example. 

She has also visited Siwa, the Red Sea, and Nubia and become inspired by the local jewellery and costumes she found there. “Nubian jewellery is special as it is uniquely designed, distinguished by its geometrical units, and customised to the character of Nubian women,” she said.

Despite the ongoing Israeli war on Gaza, Khalifa has not been able to produce a new piece that would reflect her compassion and support for the Palestinian people. “I am living in shock. It is very sad that the whole world is watching a merciless war on innocent people and yet remains silent,” she said.

Although she is by no means a recluse, she is reluctant to open up to the press. During our 90-minute talk, she would suddenly stop talking and look at me. “Are we done yet,” she would ask. “Do you still have questions to ask, dear Rania? I have work to do.” 

Her anxiety might refer to her desire to keep past painful events in the past. 

Today, Khalifa follows the news, visits art exhibitions, and attends popular music performances. She starts her day at 5:30am everyday. “It is when I am most productive. The early morning hours encourage me to work on sketches for new designs and continue my research,” she said.

She still has many dreams to accomplish. “I want to get a bigger place for my workshop,” she said. She is busy writing a book related to the jewellery industry. 

She goes to her workshop in Al-Sagha everyday at 10am and usually finishes working at 4pm. For entertainment, she loves to go to the cinema and travel to desert or sea resorts – “anywhere I can enjoy nature,” she said.

She also likes to read more generally, particularly literature and autobiography. She is currently rereading The Wretched of the Earth by the French psychiatrist Frantz Fanon and another book about George Henein, one of the pioneering figures in the Surrealism movement in Egypt. 

Though still slender and fit, she admits that she does not practise any sports. She obviously watches her diet.

From time to time, she likes to receive graduates in jewellery making from the Fine Arts and Applied Arts faculties and get into discussions about handicrafts and the future of the industry. 

She also has her small family. “My son Hassan is an author and an internationally recognised musician. Nadine is a film director. I am satisfied because they are happy, and we enjoy a good relationship.”

“Please come back soon for a visit,” she says as we end our conversation. “But this time as a friend.”

* A version of this article appears in print in the 21 November, 2024 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly