Tutankhamun, The Golden King and The Great Pharaohs exibition

Tutankhamun and his ancestor Pharaohs are holidaying in Indianapolis on their first Midwest tour following the United States premiere in Atlanta last summer. Nevine El-Aref joins them

Last week, residents of Indianapolis fell under the spell of the art and history of ancient Egyptians as the "Tutankhamun, The Golden King and The Great Pharaohs" exhibition opened its doors to the public. Streets, kiosks, restaurants and hotel forefronts were decorated with huge Egyptian and US flags, as well as posters of some of the stunning objects featured in the exhibition -- among them the exquisite gold canopic coffinette of Pharaoh Tutankhamun, a limestone head of the monotheistic ruler Akhenaten, a marble statue of Queen Hatshepsut, and a colossal seated statue of Pharaoh Sobekhotep of the Middle Kingdom.
At the forefront of the Children's Museum of Indianapolis (CMI), where the exhibition is taking place, stands a colossal replica statue of the necropolis deity Anubis greeting visitors as they pass through an ancient Egyptian-style gate guarded by two athletic-looking bodyguards wearing the ancient nemes head dress and a short white gown tied at the waist with a coloured belt decorated with lotus flowers.
After crossing the museum garden, which is decorated with gypsum replicas of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, visitors are taken back in time to the life, death, faith and afterlife of those innovative Pharaohs of ancient Egypt.
Strains of oriental music filled the evening air of the CMI's reception hall, where women and men, girls and boys dressed as Pharaohs, courtiers, servants, priests and deities roam about guiding visitors to the different sections of the "Tutankhamun, the Golden King and the Great Pharaohs" exhibition.
"Now, come, travel back in time. See where and how these rulers lived," beckons the deep voice of Hollywood's Indiana Jones, aka Harrison Ford, while a two-minute video accompanies the narrative. When the screens go quiet, massive double limestone-coloured doors, edged by a pair of carved columns decorated with lotus flowers, swing open into a labyrinth of seven galleries displaying 130 splendid ancient Egyptian artefacts from the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, many of which have never left home before. These objects focus on the splendour of the Egyptian Pharaohs, their function in the earthly and divine worlds, and what kingship meant to the Egyptian people. Fifty of the pieces are from Pharaoh Tutankhamun's tomb while the rest feature the treasures of his ancestor rulers from the pyramid builders' era through the Late Period.
The exhibition is organised thematically, with the first six galleries presenting the life of the Pharaoh and his position in ancient Egypt. The objects on display represent some of the most powerful rulers of Egypt, such as the owner of the second pyramid of Giza, Khafre; the queen who became a Pharaoh, Hatshepsut; and Psusennes I, whose magnificent golden death mask is on display. The seventh and last gallery is devoted to the treasures of the golden king Tutankhamun.
The first two galleries, "The Great Pharaohs", are dedicated to the major Pharaohs of ancient Egypt. These galleries are a superb introduction to the basic concepts of kinship in ancient times, displaying a varied collection of colossal statues of kings from the Old, Middle and New Kingdoms. Among these is a diorite statue of the Middle Kingdom ruler Amenemhat III, whose reign represented a long and stable period in which the economy flourished, the borders of Egypt remained protected, trade increased and the central administration was reorganised. It was also during his reign that the style of sculpture changed. A quartzite bas-relief of Horemhab; an unbaked clay head of Amenhotep III in the blue crown found in the Karnak cachette; a kneeling marble statue of Queen Hatshepsut holding out a vessel attached to a djed-pillar and making offerings to the gods; and a beautifully carved sculpture of Ramses II -- considered one of the finest works of its era -- are also on show.
The next three galleries, "Pharaoh's Family and Private Life", "Pharaoh's Court" and "Pharaoh's Religion", contain artefacts illustrating the royal family, life at court, and traditional and revolutionary ideology.
Among the objects on display are a coloured anthropoid cedar wood inner coffin of the 18th-Dynasty Queen Merit-Amun, a squatting statue of Senemut holding Princess Neferure, and a granodiorite seated statue of the 12th-Dynasty Queen Nofret, which represents a bold style of carving, emphasising the features of the face, the obvious gestures of the arms and the considerable mass of her wig. The details of her clothing and the pectoral suspended from her neck are rendered quite subtly.
Private belongings of the Pharaohs and their queens are also featured in this section among them are Amenhotep III's gilded wooden jewellery box decorated with faience tiles and copper edges; a faience kohl pot that belonged to Queen Tiye; and a glazed limestone, 18th-Dynasty block decorated with a papyrus pool which may have been used to hold a papyrus flat for writing. The limestone sarcophagus of the cat of the 18th-Dynasty Prince Tuthmosis, son of Pharaoh Amenhotep III, is exhibited as well as a painted part of a plaster pavement from an Amarna palace and a limestone toilet seat placed upon a latrine box from the reign of Pharaoh Akhenaten. This latrine is very interesting as it affirms that in an elite household even the sanitation and privy needs of the family were ornately decorated. An iconic limestone Amarna-style sketch of a princess nibbling at a cooked duck is also on show.
The Pharaoh's courtiers and the most important people in his court, such as viziers, scribes, the overseer of all the king's work, ambassadors, workmen and the official burial retinue, are also presented at the exhibition. Among the most beautiful objects is the limestone relief featuring the courtier Ay and his wife Tiye receiving the gold of honour, which is carved in the Amarna style. This relief was removed from Ay's tomb where it was part of a larger wall scene featuring Pharaoh Akhenaten and his wife, Queen Nefertiti, dispensing rewards to their favoured nobleman and his wife. Also shown are a colossal statue of Akhenaten and four painted limestone statues featuring Inty-Shedu, an engineer who helped build the pyramids of Giza, at different ages in life.
Next to these four statues an LCD screen shows a 10-minute documentary telling the story of the discovery of these statues. The documentary shows Zahi Hawass, secretary-general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), wearing his familiar blue jeans, on the Giza plateau where he first found them in the 1990s.
"When I found these four statues, they were inside a hidden chamber in Inty-Shedu's tomb," Hawass said. "The largest one was in the middle with two others to its left and one to its right. But I felt that something was missing. As ancient Egyptians loved symmetry I would have expected to see two small statues on each side of the larger one." He continued that when he searched carefully he did find the remains of a fourth statue made of wood, but it had almost completely disintegrated.
A limestone relief showing the arrival of scribes and dignitaries is also on show, along with a quartzite seated statue of the scribe Hapi of Ramses II's reign, which was found in the Karnak Temple cachette.
The fifth gallery concerns the Pharaoh's religion, displaying religious stelae such as that of Amenhotep I and Ahmose-Nefertari, one of two nearly identical pieces dedicated on behalf of two Egyptian workmen of the late 18th Dynasty. It depicts the two rulers Ahmose and Amenhotep I as well as Ahmose-Nefertari, "a queen and wife of Amun".
The sixth gallery, "Pharaohs' Gold", shows the extravagance of the Pharaohs' intricate jewellery, revealing where the gold came from, what it meant and how it was used through a display of a collection of necklaces, bracelets, pendants, crowns, earrings and rings decorated with semi-precious stones, scarabs and amulets. A gold mask found on the mummy of Psusennes I presides over the gold gallery. Considered by ancient Egyptians to be the skin of the gods, gold was highly prized and used extensively in royal burials to ensure divinity after life for the Pharaohs. A gold collar found on the body of Neferuptah, daughter of Amenemhat III, showcases an intricate arc of carnelian and feldspar that terminates with golden falcon heads.
Each object is not only ascribed details of its history and use, but also the material of which it was made, the place where it was unearthed and its dating.
Step by step, visitors return in time to the first quarter of the 20th century, when the British archaeologist-explorer Howard Carter discovered Tutankhamun's tomb in the Valley of the Kings.
A tented entry, larger-than-life photographs of Carter and his sponsor, Lord Carnarvon, and photographs of the dig that revealed the tomb set the scene for some of the riches discovered in 1922.
Here visitors can explore the treasures of Tutankhamun and the world of the mysterious Pharaoh. This gallery is symbolically divided into four, each devoted corresponding to the four rooms of the boy king's nearly intact tomb. Legendary artefacts from the antechamber, the annex, the treasury and the burial chamber include Tutankhamun's gold sandals, finger and toe caps, jewellery, furniture, weaponry and statuary. There is also the canopic coffinette inlaid with gold and precious stones, one of the four that contained his mummified internal organs.
Each item is shown separately in a single showcase with a special backdrop. Each backdrop features a black and white photograph of Tutankhamun's mummy wearing that particular item on the day of its discovery.
The exhibition includes the largest image of King Tut ever found -- a three-metre statue that originally may have stood in Tutankhamun's mortuary temple, and that still retains much of its original paint. This statue has a twin now at Chicago University.
Step by step, visitors then exit the dark gallery of the tomb to an external display showing photographs of Tutankhamun's mummy and the results of recent CT scans and DNA tests that finally revealed the mystery behind the death of the boy king.
The final gallery features CT scans of Tutankhamun's mummified body obtained as part of a landmark Egyptian research and conservation project, partially funded by National Geographic, to scan and investigate the ancient mummies of Egypt. The scans were captured through the use of a portable CT scanner donated by Siemens Medical Solutions, which allowed researchers to compile the first three-dimensional picture of Tutankhamun and discover more about his life and death.
These studies revealed that Pharaoh Tutankhamun was not murdered, but died at the age of 19 of complications arising from a fractured leg. This, Hawass said, justified the existence of almost 113 canes found inside the king's tomb.
Hawass announced that the results of CT scans and DNA tests recently carried out by the team on the mummies of some members of Tuthamun's family would be announced late next month following the completion of comprehensive studies. "If these result are accurate, we will absolutely identify the real parents of Tutankhamun and learn whether the beautiful Queen Nefertiti was his mother, or if he was Akhenaten's son by another secondary wife," Hawass told Al-Ahram Weekly. He added that it would also lead to the mummy of Queen Nefertiti.
"Tutankhamun's magic still captures the hearts of people all over the world, even though more than 85 years have passed since the discovery of his amazing tomb," Hawass said. America, he said, had welcomed "the Golden King", and this young king was bringing with him all the great Pharaohs of Egypt. The exhibition will raise much-needed funds for the preservation of Egypt's monuments, and the construction and renovation of museums throughout the country. "I always say that Egyptian antiquities are the heritage of the world and that we are only their guardians," Hawass said, pointing out that visitors to the exhibition would carry many memories and perhaps some questions away with them.
Aside from the stunning treasure of Pharaoh Tutankhamun, Hawass has his own favourite objects that are close to his heart since he was the one who found them during his own excavations. Among those objects are the four painted wooden statues of Inty-Shedu, which, whenever he looks into the eyes of this vibrant images, make him feel as if he has been transported 4,500 years into the past. "You catch a glimpse of the lives and spirit of the people who laboured to construct these great pyramids," Hawass told the Weekly. He continued that the statue of the priest Kai and his children was another one of his discoveries. "I will never forget how I felt when I peered through the holes in false door of Kai's tomb and saw the eyes of Kai gazing back at me," he said. "The moment when I first held this exquisite statue in my hands will remain in my memory for ever. It is the one of the best private statues to have survived from the Old Kingdom."
"Egypt's ancient treasures are among the world's greatest cultural legacies," National Geographic Society Executive Vice-President Terry Garcia said. "Even with the great wealth of research that already exists, new technologies continue to open up the past in ways never imagined. Visitors to this exhibition will not only see stunning artefacts spanning 2,000 years of ancient Egyptian history, but they will also learn more about the life and death of Tutankhamun through the recent CT scans conducted on his mummy."
Jeff Wyatt, Arts and Exhibitions International (AEI) vice-president, said the exhibition gave people a glimpse of an amazing and great civilisation that survived for more than 3,000 years. People were amazed by the technology and techniques used by the ancient Egyptians to carve these statues and fabricate these gold items. "It is something that you must see for yourself because if not you will not appreciate it and will lose a lot," Wyatt told the Weekly. He said the "Pharaohs' Gold" gallery was his favourite section in the exhibition, describing it as very intimate and well lit, which, he said, highlighted the beauty of these magnificent gold objects. In Atlanta, he continued, his favourite gallery was the one on the Pharaohs' religion. "It was quite beautiful there," Wyatt said. "Here, although we did not have much space here in CMI, to spread the section out, in fact the gold gallery is much better displayed."
In fact, Wyatt claimed, the most difficult problem the organisers faced in installing the items at the CMI was that they had a smaller gallery than the previous one in Atlanta. It was a challenge to display the artefacts and make them fit into the space they had.
"It was really a challenge, but at the end the exhibition came out as great as the previous one and I think the results turned out well," Wyatt concluded.
Exhibition designer Tom Fricker concurred with Wyatt's opinion and admitted that it had not been easy to fit a large show into a smaller space. For him, he said, it was like trying to put more furniture into a small house. "The only way to solve such a problem was to provide a different arrangement than the one that was in Atlanta, but still maintaining the sequence of the galleries and the story it relates," Fricker told the Weekly. He explained that in order to achieve a solution, they had to move some of the larger scale graphics concerning the CT scan images out of the inner exhibition space and display them in another space outside the exhibition. "We did really succeed," Fricker said, and he added that he was extremely happy with the results and to put on show such an intact exhibition in terms of story and certainly concerning the artefacts.
Using the colour of the limestone as the exhibition backdrop added a dramatic element, although some might have questioned the use of a colour that some might describe as dull.
"Such a colour is evocative of the places that the artefacts come from," Fricker responds. "The limestone colour is the colour of the Giza Plateau and Saqqara. I chose this colour to complement the objects in contrast with the theme of each gallery in an attempt to suggest the sense of moving from one space to another."
Fricker explained that the first galleries had a lighter backdrop value in colour as they displayed an exterior environment, and then it goes progressively darker. The idea was to transport visitors from one sense to another in an attempt to support the theme of each gallery and to explain the environment in which it originated. For example, the section that displayed the Pyramid Builders had to have a lighter backdrop to suggest an exterior environment, while the one displaying the courtiers had to have a darker backdrop suggesting an interior milieu. "This can easily be noticed in the gold gallery and the one that displays Tutankhamun's funeral treasures to express his burial chamber atmosphere," Fricker commented.
He sees this exhibition is different from its counterpart in San Francisco, "Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs" for two reasons. First, the Indianapolis exhibition covers 2,000 years of Pharaohs in ancient Egyptian history while the one in San Francisco focuses on the 18th-Dynasty rulers, especially Tutankhamun, his family members and his ancestors. The second differentiation was that the second half of the Indianapolis exhibition was about the discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb, expressed by taking visitors right into 1922 to reveal the entrance to the tomb in a good, dramatic scene, and inviting them to explore the tomb on the day of its discovery. Unlike the one in San Francisco, the objects of the tomb were grouped in a replica tomb chamber, just as when they were discovered. Here, Fricker continued, they were making a point to show how the tomb was organised architecturally as to the objects discovered. The last gallery is very special as it shows all the objects found on the mummy itself. The exhibition ends with a colossal figure of Pharaoh Tutankhamun, which was found 10 years after the tomb discovery.
Fricker told the Weekly that organising such an exhibition was for him a unique and great experience. At the same time it would encourage him to design similar exhibition in the future.
It was, he said, an incredible experience to be provided with the opportunity to go to Egypt, work with Egyptologists and collaborate with the curators. "It is a really a collaborative work of the whole team," he said. "We all come together to create something that we are very proud of."
For Curator David Silverman, the exhibition is very different from those he worked on previously in 1970s and in 2005, as it displays a broader picture of ancient Egypt. The one in the 1970s related a very tight story as it focussed only on the 10-year-long reign of Tutankhamun, while the one that started in 2005 and is now in San Francisco covers a whole one line through representing the life of Tutankhamun and his direct ancestors.
Silverman said that another reason was that "Tutankhamun the Golden King and the Great Pharaohs" exhibition provided an opportunity for a larger number of people to admire a distinguished collection of objects, as some of them had never travelled out of the country.
He said that choosing the CMI to host the exhibition was a wonderful choice for a symbolic reason. Tutankhamun was the boy king, and he came to the throne when he was a young child of nine years old. His artefacts related to that, and the children related to them, and that was extremely important as it was an incredible combination of a boy king in a museum for children.
On opening night a gala dinner was held in the museum to celebrate the launch of the exhibition. During the ceremony a representative of Indianapolis mayor Gregory A Ballard offered Hawass a certificate of honour for his contribution to the extraordinary learning experiences of families and children in the US. Hawass had brought the unique treasures of Egypt's past to the CMI, while giving the inspiration to design and create one of the most important museums in Egypt, the Suzanne Mubarak Children's Museum. Ballard also proclaimed 26 June as Zahi Hawass day in Indianapolis.
Jeffery Patchen, president of the CMI, called the award a great decoration to be offered by the Indianapolis mayor, and pointed out that it was usually given to organisations and this was the first time it had been awarded to an individual.
John Norman, president of Arts and Exhibition International, described the exhibition as a gratifying work as it allowed all its partners to participate in an ancient Egyptian wish: "Causing his name to live". "Funerary texts often included a phrase like this to ensure that the memory of the deceased and the spirit of the individual would continue to live in perpetuity in the afterlife," Norman told the Weekly. He continued that "by tradition, the children and ancestors would fulfil this role, but as Tutankhamun had no direct heirs to succeed him, in a way each of us who sees this exhibition partakes of its marvels and repeats his name, helping to ensure that Tutankhamun will indeed achieve immortality."
"I am very happy. It is an unforgettable experience," said nine-year-old Abby Morgan as she gazed at the gold coffinette. Today, she told the Weekly, "I was my mum's guide. I have read Tut's Mummy: Lost and Found and I know these objects from before," she said. "I am really fascinated by the story of a young boy who became king at my age," Morgan added.
Juddy Walsh and his son John, who were admiring the boy king's boat, saw the exhibition as a great opportunity for them to better understand Egypt's ancient and modern civilisations. "I wanted to make sure that we were here for opening day," said Walsh. "I knew it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity."
Holding a Hawass hat in one hand and a huge book on the exhibition in the other, 10-year-old Jammar was almost jumping for joy. "I can't believe that I am here face to face with Hawass. He is my hero," Jammar told the Weekly. He said his first connection with Hawass was last year when his school teacher gave his class an assignment to write a letter to a famous personality, and of course Jammar chose Hawass since he was one of his major fans. In return, Jammar continued, Hawass responded to him through e-mail and invited him to a personally-guided tour of the Giza Pyramid. "Jammar almost didn't sleep last night," said his mother Jennifer. "He was that excited to meet Hawass that he couldn't sleep well."


Take me There... Egypt


AS THE EXHIBITION visitors follow Egypt's long period of ancient history they will also be taken aboard an EgyptAir flight to explore modern Egypt, where they will experience city and rural life as well as many of the traditions and celebrations. After almost ten minutes of flight in a replica plane, visitors will be transported to another exhibition called "Take me There... Egypt" where they will begin another adventure through modern Egypt to better understand Egypt's most recent culture. CMI President Jeffery Patchen told the Weekly that some children in America thought that Egyptians lived in pyramids and that when they died they became mummies. It was crazy, he said, but they did not really know any different.
In "Take me There... Egypt", Patchen said, families, and especially children, would be fascinated to learn about the differences and also surprised by some of the commonalties Americans share with Egyptians.
To the azan sound and the ringing of church bells, the Indianapolis visitors take a look through the several different lenses of Egypt. Here is an urban apartment and a rural home, and there a marketplace with a coffeehouse, fruit stand, grocery store, clothing store, a tent maker and a herbalist's shop.
The exhibition features a variety of hands-on activities and family learning opportunities. Families can play a trivia game to test their knowledge of Egyptian families, play "I Spy" as they examine Egyptian currency or visit the local herbalist and play a computer game in which they must prescribe a remedy. They can discover the historical importance and the modern-day environmental challenges of the revered River Nile, and find out about important Egyptian sites from the Avenue of Sphinxes to an archaeological site in Sohag.
In the clothes store, visitors see how traditional Egyptian wear is mixed with more Western-style clothing. Families can also see and hear Egyptian instruments and music, including contemporary pop music. In the arts area, calligraphy, jewellery, rugs and carpet making are also featured and visitors can learn how artists use the inlay process to create beautiful mother-of-pearl boxes and tables. Visitors can create their own table-top design or arrange beads on small dowels to create an Arabesque pattern.
Patchen told the Weekly that the most unique feature of the exhibition was the immersive experiences in which visitors could participate. In "Take me There... Egypt", visitors will not only see Egyptian culture but will play a part in it. They can participate in a traditional Egyptian ceremony known as the sebou. This joyous celebration, which welcomes a new baby into the community seven days after its birth, began thousands of years ago and is still practised today. Patchen continued that visitors were invited into the happy home where a child has recently been born, and they take part in the preparations, the music and the fun of this exciting ceremony. This exhibition also covers language and communication through teaching children how to speak and write a little bit of Arabic, learn the meanings of few words such as "welcome", "how much?", "delicious" and the words for some foods.
John Lechleiter, chairman of the CMI board, said registered school groups could participate in a sebou or in the majlis al-sulh, a traditional form of conflict resolution. Students, he added, might serve as advisers for those involved, as journalists who watched and reported on the process or as council members who decided on a fair resolution.
An exciting trip is not complete without a postcard back home. So, Lechleiter said, before visitors left the exhibition they could sort through photographs of the exhibition and record a message about their experiences. They could e-mail their story back home or send it to family, friends or teachers to tell them about their adventures.
Patchen told the Weekly that "Take me There... Egypt" was the CMI's newest permanent gallery and would focus on a different culture every four years. The idea of the exhibition came up four years ago when the CMI worked with Hawass on National Geographic map exhibition. "We were inspired in doing that exhibition by focussing on another country," Patchen said. "We first thought of displaying Ghanaian culture but when we started to work with Mrs Suzanne Mubarak at the Suzanne Mubarak Children's Museum we were so excited about Egypt that we changed our minds and decided that the first country to cover would be Egypt."
Back in Indianapolis, the CMI talked to Egyptian families in the US and asked for their help in meeting families in Cairo and in rural areas. This gave them the opportunity to find out more about modern Egyptian culture. These families, Patchen said, were generous enough to allow the CMI to take pictures of their homes, children and friends. "EgyptAir was kind enough to let us use its logo and the plane, and so it all evolved like that to make the dream come true," he said.






A wooden colossal statue of King Tutankhamun; A colossal head of King Shabaka






Khafre



limestone toilet seat discovered in an Amarna palace



a collection from the "Pharaos' Gold" gallery











An iconic Amarna-style sketch of a princess nibbling at a cooked duck;



A relief removed from the tomb of the courtier Ay, a part of a wall scene where figures of Akhenaten and Nefertiti dispensed rewards to their favoured nobleman and his wife photos courtesy of Sandro Vannini



Source: http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2009/955/special.htm