Cairo’s Museum of Islamic Art recovers its grandeur
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Following years of neglect, the Museum of Islamic Art has undergone comprehensive rehabilitation not only of its building and interior design, but also of its exhibition design and displays.
The MIA was first opened in 1881 with an initial display of 111 objects gathered from mosques and mausoleums across Egypt. Since then the museum has become the main abode for the national collection of Islamic art, which had reached that huge number of 100,000 objects by 2003.
That was when the Ministry of Culture launched its comprehensive restoration project for the museum. The masterplan for the renovation and the new exhibition design was drawn up by French designer and museographer Adrien Gardère in cooperation with the Islamic Department of the Louvre Museum in Paris, which has advised on the reorganisation of the museum’s collections.
The MIA is divided into two large wings; the first is devoted to the chronological exhibition of Islamic artefacts taken in the main from monuments in historic Cairo. This wing follows a broadly chronological approach in its presentation of the collection, progressing through the Umayyad, Abbasid, Tulunid, Fatimid, Ayubid, Mamluk and Ottoman periods while also including various thematic displays.
The second wing displays materials from other countries in the Islamic world. These include calligraphy; manuscripts; ceramics; mosaics; textiles; gravestones; mashrabiya (latticed woodwork); wooden objects; metal and glass vessels; incense burners and caskets; pottery; metalwork and glass lamps dating from various periods in Islamic history. These objects are displayed according to both chronology and theme, provenance and material.
The renovated museum has state-of-the-art security and lighting systems, a fully-equipped restoration laboratory, a children’s museum and a library.
Excerpted from an article Nevine El-Aref for Al-Ahram
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