01.11.2010
At EXPO 2010 in Shanghai more than five million visitors flocked to see the Pavilion of Urban Footprints which featured the National Museums in Berlin with numerous world-famous objects from its Pergamonmuseum on the Museum Island. Exquisite loans from the Museum of the Ancient Near East - including a striding lion formed from glazed brick fragments from the Processional Way and a dragon from the Ishtar Gate - were vital additions to the elaborate and colourful reconstructions of the world renowned Processional Way and Ishtar Gate of the ancient city of Babylon.
The pavilion, curated by the Shanghai Museum, depicted the history of urban development from its very beginnings to the present day. The city of Babylon, one of the most important cities of antiquity, was presented under the banner of 'Urban Development' in the second of a total of four sections.
The Shanghai EXPO drew to a close on Sunday, after running for six months. It was visited by around 73 million people, a new record for a world's fair exhibition.
The National Museums in Berlin also to appear in Beijing
In conjunction with the Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden (Dresden State Art Collections) and Munich's Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen (Bavarian State Painting Collections), the National Museums in Berlin will be holding a major exhibition on the art of the Enlightenment in the National Museum of China in Beijing next spring. The show, which will see more than 400 exhibits go on display over an area of 2700 square metres, will feature at its heart artworks which best exemplify the great ideas of this period, their influence on the visual fine arts and their historical impact, from the artistic revolutions of the 18th century right up to the present day.