Sunken Egyptian treasure gets European tour

An exhibition featuring artefacts discovered off the coast of Egypt is set to tour Europe. “Egypt’s Sunken Secrets” is organised by Franck Goddio, the founder of the European Institute for Underwater Archaeology, in association with Egypt’s Ministry of State for Antiquities. Artefacts have been selected from museums across the country, including 18 from the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, while over 200 come from recent underwater explorations by Goddio’s team.

In a press release, Mamdouh el-Damaty, Egypt’ s head of antiquities, said that the exhibition will strengthen cultural ties between Egypt and the EU, encourage tourism to Egypt, and bring in €600,000 of funding for the ministry, as well as an additional €1 per ticket after the 100,000th visitor. The ministry currently has suffered from a shortage of income, due to the drastic reduction in tourism caused by the recent violence in the region.

The exhibition is due to stop at the Institut du monde arabe in Paris (7 June 2015- 7 January 2016), the Martin-Gropius-Bau exhibition hall in Berlin (15 April-15 August 2016), and an unspecified venue in London (15 November 2016-15 March 2017). Previous exhibitions that have included artefacts discovered by Goddio’ s team off the coast of Alexandria and Thônis/Heracleion, organised in association with the Ministry of Antiquities, toured Europe, the USA and Japan between 2006 and 2013.

Author: Garry Shaw | Source: The Art Newspaper [October 27, 2014]