THE QUEST FOR IMMORTALITY LECTURE SERIES

Fees: Free for museum members and students with a valid student ID, $5 for non-members.

Secrets of the Pyramids and Mummies at Bahariya
Speaker: Dr. Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities

Wednesday, August 31, 7:00 p.m. SOLD OUT
Thursday, September 1, 7:00 p.m.  SOLD OUT

The world's leading Egyptologist, Dr. Zahi Hawass is Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities in Cairo, Egypt and the Director of Excavations at the ancient archeological sites of Giza and Bahariya Oasis.  Hawass is credited with major discoveries such as the unusual double statue of Ramsses II at Giza and the tombs of the Giza pyramid builders.  In 1999, Hawass led an excavation and preservation project at Egypt’s Bahariya Oasis that discovered more than 200 Greco-Roman mummies, many of them lavishly gilded.  This ancient cemetery, now called the Valley of the Golden Mummies, may hold hundreds more mummies and is considered one of the most important finds in Egypt since the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb.  Hawass will discuss these phenomenal discoveries and their significance.

Thursday, September 8, 7:30 p.m.

The Quest for Immortality: An Exploration of New Kingdom After-Life Beliefs

Speaker: Dr. Betsy Bryan, Chair of the Johns Hopkins University Department of Near Eastern Studies, guest curator of The Quest for Immortality: Treasures of Ancient Egypt

The Quest for Immortality is an exhibition designed to illustrate ancient Egyptian ideas about the afterlife.  A centerpiece of the exhibition is the facsimile of the burial chamber of King Thutmose III (c. 1479-1425 BCE) on the walls of which is written and painted the book that described the funerary beliefs of the time – the Amduat.  It tells the story of the sun god’s triumph over death and his achievement of immortality for all those who followed him.  The objects in the exhibition were selected from the great museums of Egypt for their inherent beauty as well as to explain and represent the images and concepts of the Amduat.  This lecture will introduce the exhibition and the Egyptian idea of the afterlife in the New Kingdom (c. 1550-1100 BCE).

Sunday, October 23, 4:00 p.m.

The Magic of Ancient Egyptian Art
Speaker: Dr. Robert Ritner, Associate professor of Egyptology, Oriental Institute, University of Chicago.

Dismissed by the Greeks and even some modern scholars as primitive, ancient Egyptian art is in fact a complex means of communication.   Ancient Egyptian art lacks key elements associated with advanced painting and sculpture.  Its figures take on impossible poses and the art lacks perspective.  But it is these elements that reveal the magic of ancient Egyptian art. Ancient Egyptian art is a whole new way of seeing the world and Dr. Rittner will explain how viewers can “read” the magic of these ancient artworks.

Sunday, November 6, 4:00 pm

Egyptian Mummies in Fact and Fantasy

Speaker: Carter Lupton, Curator of Ancient History, Milwaukee Public Museum

Mummies are the tangible remains of the ancient Egyptians’ quest for immortality.  In one form or another we come across mummies, from art museums to drive–in movies and everywhere in between.  Mummies had particular contexts in ancient Egypt, altered contexts throughout history in academic research and museum interpretations, and still other contexts in the modern folklore which has grown up through literature, film and popular culture.  Whether perceived as artistic or ghoulish, historic or scientific, comical or frightening, mummies are understood and misunderstood on many levels.  This talk will examine the many images of mummies, from Edgar Allan Poe to Gary Larson’s Far Side, from Howard Carter and King Tut to Boris Karloff and Brendan Fraser, from Herodotus in 450 B.C. to 21st century state of the art research.