New gallery at the Oriental Museum, Durham, UK

Oriental Museum

The Oriental Museum in Durham (part of the University of Durham) has opened a new gallery featuring Egyptian art.

Opened on the 10th July 2009, the display includes both familiar objects and items that have never previously been on display.

There is some brief information about the Egyptian collections on the museum's website.

The Ancient Egyptian collections at Durham Univerisity are some of the finest in the UK and include a number of world famous and unique objects.

Since 2008 the main Eygptian gallery at the Oriental Museum has been closed to allow for a major tour of Japan. The tour has now returned to Durham and we have used this opportunity to create a completely new gallery designed to showcase the highlights of this important collection.

The new gallery opens to the public for the first time this July. Even if you are a regular visitor to the Oriental Museum there will be plenty to see as the new gallery includes objects never seen on display in the UK before.

The university is apparently happy with the above-mentioned exhibition's tour of Japan.

Commodity Online

A 12-month touring exhibition in Japan displaying a range of ancient Egyptian artefacts - including a number of gold pieces - has been deemed a success for one UK University.

Durham University's Oriental Museum sent the exhibition on a tour that resulted in the collection being seen by nearly 200,000 Japanese visitors, the Journal reports.

Among the items on display were a number of tiny gold amulets, unique ancient jewellery and a gilded gold and painted mummy face mask.

The museum earned £60,000 in revenue that has been put into redecorating its Egyptian gallery, which will reopen to the public after a two-year closure tomorrow (July 10th) with an array of old and new exhibits.

"Closing the gallery and undertaking the tour of Japan has given us the time and funding to undertake vital conservation on delicate objects, which we are now able to display to the public for the first time," commented museum curator Craig Barclay.

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