Museum Reinstallation Gives New Life to Ancient Egyptian Objects

Many of the objects in the art museum's ancient Egyptian collection were made for the owner's use in the "afterlife," and they are having a sort of rebirth as many as 6,000 years after their creation. Seventy-eight pieces from the museum's Egyptian collection have been reorganized, newly labeled, and reinstalled. The expanded and refurbished exhibition opened February 20 and will be on permanent display.

>>> The addition of a spacious new display case permits the museum to display objects that had been long tucked away in storage. Here curator Wendy Watson and installation designer Bob Fuglestad examine some Egyptian pottery.

Although there are no mummies, the museum has sculptures, statuettes, cosmetic vessels, amethyst jewelry, predynastic pottery, alabaster canopic jars (which held a mummy's embalmed internal organs), a bronze mirror, faience amulets worn for magical protection, and gaming pieces similar to modern dice.

One highlight of the reinstallation is a relief sculpture showing the head of King Amenhotep I of Egypt's eighteenth dynasty. An adjoining fragment with the rest of the king's figure resides in the Egyptian Museum in Turin, Italy. Guest curator Diana Wolfe Larkin's recent discovery of the transatlantic match of these separated elements is one result of fresh scholarship on the museum's holdings prompted by the gallery reinstallation. Larkin, a visiting assistant professor of art, also wrote explanatory labels for the artworks.

The collection was arranged by New York designer Clifford LaFontaine and installed in display cases custom-built and prepared by MHC carpenters, painters, and electricians.