Ancient Egypt Exhibit Hall
at the Anniston Museum of Natural History
at the Anniston Museum of Natural History
The "Ancient Egypt" exhibit hall was the result of a re-design and re-installation of the Museum's 2,000-year-old Egyptian mummies. It was completed in 2002. I served as the graphic designer on an in-house exhibition team that included a preparator, exhibits manager and two carpenters. The exhibition hall architecture was designed by a contract exhibit designer who also suggested a color palette for various aspects of the project.
The ancient Egyptians based their belief system on the behavior of animals. When an ancient Egyptian died they were mummified (if they could afford it), and the mummy was covered with colorful images of animal deities (cartonnage). This was the concept on which we based the object and educational content for this exhibit hall. Mounted specimens of these animals, such as the asp, the jackal, and the crane, were presented with exhibit panels explaining the theology developed by the ancient Egyptians.
The graphic design was comprehensive and involved not only content of exhibition text panels (type/image), but design of the panels and their placement within the exhibits. The exhibit preparator was a talented artist in addition to installing the exhibition objects, she designed a colorful frieze that she hand-painted around the perimeter of the exhibit hall. I incorporated the lotus blossom from this frieze into the object text panels. The four panels of the hands-on station were in the shape of the cartouche, the elliptical shape in which Egyptian hieroglyphs were placed. At this station, visitors could smell the scents associated with mummification—myrrh, linseed oil, cinnamon—in blue,Egyptian glass vases that we mounted to little ledges on the panels.
One of the more interesting aspects of the project involved piecing together a series of x-rays taken of one of the mummies during the1970's. The images required “creative” scaling and editing in order to create a montage.
The ancient Egyptians based their belief system on the behavior of animals. When an ancient Egyptian died they were mummified (if they could afford it), and the mummy was covered with colorful images of animal deities (cartonnage). This was the concept on which we based the object and educational content for this exhibit hall. Mounted specimens of these animals, such as the asp, the jackal, and the crane, were presented with exhibit panels explaining the theology developed by the ancient Egyptians.
The graphic design was comprehensive and involved not only content of exhibition text panels (type/image), but design of the panels and their placement within the exhibits. The exhibit preparator was a talented artist in addition to installing the exhibition objects, she designed a colorful frieze that she hand-painted around the perimeter of the exhibit hall. I incorporated the lotus blossom from this frieze into the object text panels. The four panels of the hands-on station were in the shape of the cartouche, the elliptical shape in which Egyptian hieroglyphs were placed. At this station, visitors could smell the scents associated with mummification—myrrh, linseed oil, cinnamon—in blue,Egyptian glass vases that we mounted to little ledges on the panels.
One of the more interesting aspects of the project involved piecing together a series of x-rays taken of one of the mummies during the1970's. The images required “creative” scaling and editing in order to create a montage.