Treasured: How Tutankhamun Shaped a Century by Christina Riggs

Author:Christina Riggs [Riggs, Christina]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781838950514
Google: 4895zgEACAAJ
Publisher: Atlantic Books
Published: 2021-11-15T23:26:27.114109+00:00

The mask at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC with Thomas Hoving, Ibrahim Nawawy, John Carter Brown, and museum security guards

Hoving also made the case for the Metropolitan Museum to take the lead in organizing the new ‘Treasures of Tutankhamun’ tour – what Carter Brown referred to as ‘the dirty work’ when the two men smiled through gritted teeth for a joint press conference announcing the tour in September 1976. The funerary mask of Tutankhamun had already arrived. Instead of aeroplanes, the artefacts had travelled with the US Navy, first on the provisioning ship USS Milwaukee from Alexandria to Naples, and then on a stores ship, the USS Sylvania to Norfolk, Virginia. During the press conference, a museum technician in white gloves un-crated the mask and ‘peeled its saran shroud’, reported Grace Glueck for the New York Times (referring to the American brand of plastic kitchen wrap).16 Also on hand for the announcement were Mohamed Shaker, chargé d’affaires for the Egyptian Embassy; Ronald Berman, chair of the National Endowment for Humanities; and arts advisor Peter Solmssen from the State Department.

Glueck followed up the announcement of the Tutankhamun tour with a feature asking whether the State Department was ‘sweetening its dealings with foreign governments’ through museum exhibitions such as Tutankhamun and loans of art from Russia and China.17 Solmssen firmly and politely denied this, explaining that his office was only helping to facilitate ideas that came from museums themselves. America was not sweetening the deal so much as smoothing the way for goodwill gestures that had no political intent. Whether or not anyone believed that, the way was clear for Tutankhamun to conquer America – again.

* * *

In his colourful memoir, Thomas Hoving took much of the credit for the organization, design, and marketing success of ‘Treasures of Tutankhamun’.18 The Metropolitan Museum’s head curator of Egyptian art, Christine Lilyquist, remembers it rather differently. Lilyquist already had her hands full implementing the re-erection of Dendur temple and overseeing the full-scale renovation of the Egyptian galleries.19 For the design of the new galleries, she arranged for Hoving and architect Kevin Roche to visit Egypt with her, to better understand the physical context and natural environment in which Egyptian art had been designed. During their visit, they joined Gamal Mukhtar – head of the Egyptian Antiquities Organization – for a lively dinner in Cairo, where drinks and belly dancers were on the menu. (The premier dancer of the day, Nagwa Fouad, was a favourite of Mukhtar’s and had performed for Nixon and Kissinger, too.) Over dinner, the topic of the Tutankhamun exhibition came up. It was the first Lilyquist had heard about it, as far as she recalls, but the loan had already been agreed. Hence ‘Treasures’ landed on her plate as well.

Since fifty tomb objects had travelled to London for the fiftieth anniversary hook of the British Museum show, the United States was to receive fifty-five objects to mark the fifty-fifth anniversary. Hoving claimed that choosing objects for the tour came down to his connoisseurial eye and impeccable taste.

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