Campus news

Media Advisory: Hearst Museum offers media preview of Egyptian exhibit

By Media Relations

Contact: Kathleen Maclay
(510)643-5651
kmaclay@berkeley.edu

ATTENTION: Photographers and reporters covering the arts, museums, conservation and ancient history

WHAT

A media preview of The Conservators Art: Preserving Egypts Past, a new exhibit opening Thursday, April 29, at the Phoebe Apperson Hearst Museum of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley.

The exhibit features exceptional artifacts from the Hearst Museums vast Egyptian collection including crocodile mummies, mummy portraits, statuary, amulets and unusual reserve heads used in Egyptian burial practices.

The exhibit examines how technology and the humanities work together to enhance the conservation and understanding of ancient objects. It also aims to demystify the work of archaeologists and conservators, and to promote a dialogue with the public about their work and how museums help preserve cultural heritage.

WHEN

12:30- 3 p.m., Tuesday, April 27

WHERE

The Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology gallery, on the first floor of Kroeber Hall on the UC Berkeley campus, near the intersection of Bancroft Way and College Avenue. A campus map is available.

DETAILS

The preview will include a brief presentation about the exhibit and a tour of the gallery with experts. A few downloadable images from the exhibit are available.

The exhibit is a memorial to the late Cathleen Candy Keller, a UC Berkeley associate professor of Egyptology who was its original curator. Carol Redmount, curator of Egyptian archaeology for the Hearst and associate professor of Egyptian archaeology, assumed the task after Kellers death in 2008.

Philanthropist Phoebe Hearsts deep interest in Egypt spurred her to commission several noted archaeologists to collect objects around the turn of the 20th century that ranged from the Predynastic to Coptic periods and included well-documented materials excavated from the Greek and Roman site of Tebtunis. These Egyptian treasures are among the most important of the museums 3.8 million objects.

General museum admission is free. More details are available online.