250,000 people have already seen ‘China and Egypt: Cradles of the World’ at the Neues Museum

24.10.2017
Neues Museum

In the four months since its opening, a quarter of a million people have already visited the special exhibition ‘China and Egypt: Cradles of the World’, currently on show at the Neues Museum on the Museumsinsel. The show is a collaboration between the Staatliche Museen (specifically its Egyptian collections: the Ägyptische Museum und Papyrussammlung) and the Shanghai Museum and will run for another month until 3 December 2017.

Today Friederike Seyfried, director of the Egyptian Museum and Papyrus Collection, joined Mariana Jung, exhibition curator, to greet the 250,000th visitor to the exhibition: Lotte Sommerwerck and her friend Ruth Dahlhoff. The two pupils from Essen had come to Berlin on a short trip to visit, among other things, the exhibition and the Neues Museum.

Exhibition at the Neues Museum

China and Egypt: Cradles of the World’ presents for the first time ancient Egyptian and ancient Chinese artefacts side by side. Thanks to an array of important loans from the Shanghai Museum, enriched by objects from the Staatliche Museen’s own Ethnologisches Museum and Museum für Asiatische Kunst, numerous objects from the ‘Middle Kingdom’ (China) are now on show in Berlin for the first time. The exhibition features about 250 unique objects, including significant treasures from both civilizations, and covers a timespan that reaches from 4500 BC into the Greco-Roman period that lasted from 332 BC to 312 AD.

‘China and Egypt: Cradles of the World’ traces the cultural developments that laid the foundations for great civilizations in these two regions. Although there was no direct contact between ancient China and ancient Egypt, comparison of the two cultures reveals a surprising number of similarities despite their differences. Each of the objects displayed both presents its own history in the context of its particular cultural environment, and also relates to objects of the other culture. The exhibition tells these stories through five thematic chapters:

• Everyday life
• Writing
• Funerary cult
• Religious life
• Forms of government

Inclusive content and accessibility, and tickets

There are many ways for our diverse visitors to access the exhibition content, including replicas to touch and hold, labels in Braille, an audio-guide in simple German and an extensive education programme for visitors with impairments. These offerings provide multi-sensory access to the objects and exhibition content. In addition, adults and children have the opportunity to deepen their knowledge of the exhibition content by taking part in workshops, tours with the curators and tandem tours with two experts from totally different disciplines. Time-slot tickets, which allow you to visit the exhibition without queuing, can be booked online in advance via: Ticketshop of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin.

Promotion and support

‘China and Egypt: Cradles of the World’ is generously sponsored by the Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe, the main sponsor of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. The exhibition is supported by the Verein zur Förderung des Egyptischen Museum Berlin e. V. and Museum&Location.