Egypt throws open the doors to its $1bn museum after years of upheaval

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Prime ministers, presidents and royalty descended on Cairo on Saturday to attend the spectacular opening of a sprawling museum built near the pyramids to house one of the world’s richest collections of antiquities.

The opening of the $1 billion Grand Egyptian Museum, or MINI, marks the end of two decades of construction efforts marred by Arab Spring uprisings, pandemics and wars in neighboring countries.

“We have all dreamed of this project and will it come true,” Prime Minister Mustafa Madbouly told a press conference, calling the museum “a gift from Egypt to the whole world from a country whose history goes back more than 7,000 years.”

Spectators, including President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, gathered outside the museum late Saturday before a giant screen, projecting images of the country’s most famous cultural sites in glittering pharaonic-style robes with glowing orbs and sceptres.

‘A new chapter for Egypt’

They were accompanied by Egyptian pop stars and an international orchestra under a sky decorated in white with lasers, fireworks and hovering lights embedded in hieroglyphics.

By opening the museum, Egypt was “writing a new chapter in the present and future story of this ancient nation,” Sisi said at the opening.

The audience included German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoff, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Democratic Republic of Congo President Felix Shiskedi, and the crown princes of Oman and Bahrain.

The museum’s most developed attraction is the vast collection of treasures from Tutankhamun’s tomb, which was uncovered in 1922, including the Boy King’s golden burial mask, throne and sarcophagus, and thousands of other objects.

A colossal statue of Remus II, which sat for decades in a Cairo square in the city named after the pharaoh, now adorns the Grand Entry Hall.

The complex’s sleek design, evoking the pyramids, cuts a stark contrast to the dusty and often outmoded displays in the neoclassical Egyptian museum that overlooked Tarir Square in central Cairo a century ago.

The old museum returned

The old museum has suffered notoriety in recent years, including the looting of several display cases during Egypt’s 2011 uprising, when antiquities were stolen.

In 2014, the beard of Tutankhamun’s burial mask broke off when workers were changing the lights in the display case, then clumsily retracted. The following year, the mask was more properly restored and put back on display.

Officials hope the new museum can dispel the perception created by such incidents that Egypt is neglecting to care for its priceless treasures, and add weight to its claims for Egyptian objects housed in museums abroad.

“Is it a national shrine or a global showcase? A gesture of cultural sovereignty or a tool of soft power?” Read an article in a special edition of Al-Ahram, the state-run weekly for the museum, which he called “a philosophy as much as it is a building.”

“It’s not a copy of the Louvre or the British Museum. It’s Egypt’s response to both. Those museums were born out of empire. It was born out of authenticity.”

The museum’s $1 billion-plus price tag was financed in large part by Japanese development loans. Designed by Henghan Peng Architects, an Irish firm, it covers an area of ​​approximately 120 acres, making it the same size as Vatican City.

Officials are also betting that the museum, the latest in a series of mega-projects launched or completed since 2014, could spur a revival in tourism, a key source of foreign currency for an economy reeling from years of regional conflict and economic uncertainty.

A series of galleries were opened late last year, but many exhibits were not accessible to the public.