Blank Space: What’s Missing from the Metropolitan Museum’s “Ancient Egypt” Show? (with video)

The Metropolitan Museum’s grand Ancient Egypt Transformed: The Middle Kingdom (Oct. 12-Jan. 24) displays some 230 objects, ranging from monumental stone sculptures to delicate jewelry—“the first comprehensive exhibition to be presented of Middle Kingdom art,” in the words of Met director Tom Campbell.

Thanks in large measure to the museum’s own excavations, about one-third of the show comes from the Met’s own rich collection…

…while the rest is culled from 37 lenders in North America and Europe.

There’s one thing, though, that this wide-ranging Egyptian show conspicuously lacks—loans from Egypt.

In his glowing NY Times review, Holland Cotter ignored or was unaware of this glaring omission, calling this heavyweight exhibition, “a classic Met product.” But in calmer times, a “classic” Met show of Egyptian art, like its 2006 Hatshepsut: From Queen to Pharaoh, would have included important loans from the country of origin (not to mention attendance at the press preview by Egypt’s then head of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, Zahi Hawass).

We can all guess why Egyptian loans and dignitaries were no-shows this time. Here’s how a Met spokesperson explained the situation to me, after conferring with the curatorial staff:

It has been a complicated time in Egypt, and it was not possible to secure loans as far in advance as major exhibitions like this one—and the related catalogues—require. As the situation in Egypt continues to improve, we hope to borrow from Egyptian museums in the future.

We have excellent relations with our Egyptian colleagues, we continue our cooperation with the Ministry of Antiquities with our excavation and restoration projects at Malqata and Dahshur, and we hosted the director of Upper Egyptian museums in Egypt as part of the Global Museum Leaders Colloquium.

The Met’s recent Assyria to Iberia and Beyond Babylon shows, while breathtakingly comprehensive, were both diminished by the inability to borrow key objects from the Middle East. One of the many unfortunate byproducts of chaos in that region is that cultural exchanges, like so many other normal, mutually rewarding activities, have had to be put on hold.

In the CultureGrrl Video below, which kicks off with Campbell, you’ll hear Diana Craig Patch, curator in charge of the Egyptian art department, call the Met’s holdings, “the finest collection of Middle Kingdom art outside of Egypt.” There was no mention that the elephant was not in the room.

It’s anyone’s guess how long we’ll have to wait before we can once again welcome into American museums Egyptian objects from the world’s finest collection.