"Ancient Egypt" .. Dutch exhibition ignites the anger of the Egyptians
A dispute between Egypt and a Dutch exhibition due to linking ancient history to African origins (archive-expressive)
The New York Times highlighted the angry Egyptian reactions to a new exhibition organized by a Dutch museum that considered "Egypt is part of Africa".
And the newspaper stated in a report, Sunday, that the exhibition, which was held at the National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden, goes beyond geography, to explore the experiences of musicians of African origin, such as Beyoncé, Tina Turner and others, who are inspired and proud of the idea that ancient Egypt is an African culture.
According to the newspaper, the exhibition is seen as a salutary corrective event to centuries of cultural erasure of Africans.
The newspaper stated that this exhibition angered the Egyptian government and many Egyptians, who flooded the museum's Facebook and Google pages with complaints, because of what they describe as Western appropriation of their history.
The newspaper pointed out that many Egyptians do not see themselves as Africans at all, and identify with Arab and Muslim majority countries in the Middle East and North Africa.
The newspaper quoted a member of the Egyptian parliament, Ahmed Bilal, as saying in a speech he delivered on May 2, shortly after the opening of the exhibition, that the exhibition "attacks the civilization and heritage of the Egyptians, and distorts the Egyptian identity."
According to the newspaper, suggestions that ancient Egypt is a cultural extension of Africans in modern times are central to some Afrocentric movements, which are cultural-political movements that arose to respond to racist and colonial ideas about the supposed inferiority of African civilizations to European civilizations. In this novel, Africans claim to be the foundation of ancient Egyptian civilization.
The newspaper points out that for the Egyptians, the claims of these movements are similar to the looting of Egyptian antiquities by Westerners after claiming credit for discovering them in past centuries, such as the Rosetta Stone, meaning that the Africans want to once again seize ancient Egypt from the Egyptians themselves.
The gallery, run by Daniel Soliman, who is half Egyptian, posted a statement online in response to the "uproar" on social media. He said he seeks to explain "why ancient Egypt was so important to these African artists and musicians and examines the roots and genesis of the cultural and intellectual movements of Africans."
Museum representatives declined to comment to the newspaper on what was behind the statement. But the show's defenders point out that most critics have not visited it.
Because of the exhibition, a team of archaeologists from a Dutch museum was prevented from conducting excavations in the rich Saqqara necropolis in Egypt, on June 8, after the museum held an exhibition that drew condemnation from the Egyptian authorities, according to what was reported by the American network, "CNN "
"If you don't respect our culture or our heritage, we will not cooperate with you," the Egyptian archaeologist who leads a group called the Campaign to Defend Egyptian Civilization, Abd al-Rahim Rayhan, told the New York Times.
And "CNN" stated that after the opening of the exhibition "Kemit:" Egypt in Hip-Hop, Jazz, Soul and Funk", the National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden received an email from the head of foreign missions of the Egyptian Antiquities Authority saying that the museum "falsifies history" with its "Afrocentric" approach, that is, (Which focuses on African civilization.
The managing director of the museum, Wim Weiland, confirmed to CNN via e-mail that the Egyptian authorities refused to grant the institution a permit for the next excavation season in Saqqara.
"The Rijksmuseum van Oeden has been operating in Saqqara since 1975," Wieland said, adding, "For the next season, the museum was refused an excavation permit."
Wieland stated that the reason for the refusal of the permit was "the date that is supposed to be forged in the current exhibition," adding that the museum is trying to "open a dialogue" with the Egyptian authorities on this issue.
According to the museum's website, the exhibition, which opened in April and continues until the third of next September, "embodies a journey through the history of music," as it reflects "the influence of ancient Egypt and Nubia ... in the work of a number of musicians of African descent, including jazz icons such as Miles Davies, Sun Ra and other modern artists like Beyoncé and Rihanna."
The Nubian kingdom was located in northeastern Africa, and extended from the Nile Valley in Egypt to what is known today as Khartoum, the Sudanese capital, and was known as the Kingdom of Kush or the "Black Pharaohs," according to CNN.
Mostafa Waziri, Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities in Egypt, did not respond to CNN's request for comment.
Welland went on to say that the aim of Kemet's exhibition is to "show and understand depictions of ancient Egypt and messages in music by black artists," as well as "to show what scholarly and Egyptian research can tell us about ancient Egypt and Nubia."
The museum encouraged visitors to "visit the exhibition and form their own opinions," saying it "welcomes respectful dialogue on the cultural heritage of Egypt and Nubia."
This is not the first time that Egypt has objected to the portrayal of its ancient ancestors as Africans.
She recently criticized the Netflix documentary series "Queen Cleopatra", which depicts the ruler of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt as a black woman.
Zahi Hawass, an Egyptologist and former Egyptian Minister of Antiquities, wrote last month that "a person with so little education can make a film that shows Cleopatra as black."
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