The Australian Museum in Sydney is gearing up to host the exhibition “Ramses and the Gold of the Pharaohs” in November as part of its fourth international tour, following its successful stops in the French capital, Paris, and the American cities of Houston and San Francisco.
Mostafa Waziri, secretary-general of the Supreme Council of Antiquities of Egypt, inspected on Sunday the halls where the artifacts will be displayed.
In a press statement, Waziri said his visit to the Australian Museum “aims to ensure the readiness of the halls to host the exhibition, the implementation of security and precautionary measures, as well as the safety and civil protection measures in place, to guarantee the safety of the archaeological artifacts.”
The exhibition comprises 181 archaeological pieces from the collections of Cairo's Egyptian Museum dating back to the era of Pharaoh Ramses II, as well as some discoveries from the Egyptian mission in the Heliopolis area of Saqqara.
Additionally, it showcases artifacts from various Egyptian museums that highlight distinctive aspects of ancient Egyptian civilization. Among them are a collection of statues, jewelry, cosmetic tools, paintings, intricately decorated stone blocks, and colorful wooden sarcophagi.
“Organizing the exhibition in Australia is of great importance for tourism promotion, as it is a country that has rarely organized exhibitions of Egyptian artifacts,” Hussein Abdel-Basir, the Director of the Antiquities Museum at the Library of Alexandria, told Asharq Al-Awsat.
“Sydney was supposed to host an exhibition of Tutankhamun years ago, but it was canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic, and the artifacts returned from London without completing their international tour,” he added.
The Australian Museum has opened reservations for the highly anticipated exhibition.
It has invited the public to embark on a captivating journey that transports them back over 3,300 years, to delve into the pulsating heart of ancient Egypt and get acquainted with one of its most renowned pharaohs.
The all-new multisensory museum experience will provide visitors with a window into the life and accomplishments of Ramses II, more commonly known as Ramses the Great, who ruled Egypt for 67 years – the second longest reign for any pharaoh, living an astonishing 92 years.