{"title":"Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt","description":"\u003cp\u003eChristiane Desroches-Noblecourt (1913–2011, France) was a French Egyptologist and curator of Egyptian antiquities at the Musée du Louvre, where she worked from 1937. She was a central figure in the UNESCO campaign to save the Nubian temples threatened by the construction of the Aswan High Dam, playing a leading role in the international effort that resulted in the relocation of the temples of Abu Simbel between 1964 and 1968. She organised and catalogued the travelling exhibition of objects from the tomb of Tutankhamun that toured the United States, Canada, Japan and France between 1961 and 1967, raising funds and international support for the rescue operation. Her scholarly catalogue for the 1967 Petit Palais exhibition, \u003cem\u003eToutankhamon et son temps\u003c\/em\u003e, drew over 1.24 million visitors and held the French attendance record for fifty years. She was appointed Conservateur en chef honoraire des Musées Nationaux and received numerous honours for her contributions to Egyptology and cultural heritage.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"desroches-noblecourt-toutankhamon-et-son-temps-petit-palais-paris-1967","title":"CHRISTIANE DESROCHES-NOBLECOURT — Toutankhamon et son temps, Musée du Petit Palais, Paris, 1967","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe cover is a single, tight crop of a face: gold, blue-striped, unmistakable even worn — the funerary mask of Tutankhamun, photographed close enough to fill the whole board. Fine crazing runs across the laminated surface, and a small chip has come away at the top corner. The back is left blank, lightly foxed, with one faint vertical crease.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePublished for the exhibition that ran at the Petit Palais from 17 February to 4 September 1967, catalogued and written entirely by Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt, curator of Egyptian antiquities at the Louvre, and inaugurated in person by André Malraux, France’s Minister of Culture. It brought together 45 objects from the royal tomb, drew over 1.24 million visitors, and held the French attendance record for fifty years, until 2019.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNone of that is the reason to look twice. Between 1961 and 1967, Egypt sent a version of this same exhibition through the United States, Canada and Japan before it reached Paris — specifically to raise money and international pressure for the UNESCO campaign then underway to save the temples of Abu Simbel from the rising water behind the new Aswan High Dam. Admission money from shows exactly like this one funded a rescue operation still in progress when this catalogue went to print; the relocation itself wasn’t declared complete until September 1968, over a year after the doors in Paris closed. Everyone who paid to get in that spring was, mechanically, helping fund a mountain being moved. Desroches-Noblecourt was one of the people making that happen — not only the exhibition’s curator, but a central figure in the Nubian rescue campaign the tickets were funding.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBound into the book is the evidence, undramatized: a photograph captioned \u003cem\u003e4 janvier 1967. Venant du Caire par la Compagnie Air France, le masque d’or de Toutankhamon arrive à Orly\u003c\/em\u003e — the actual mask, arriving as air cargo six weeks before the exhibition opened. Further in, the entry for a single chaouabti runs to full scholarly apparatus: measurements to the millimetre, materials, provenance given plainly as \u003cem\u003eTombeau de Toutankhamon\u003c\/em\u003e, a citation straight back to Howard Carter’s own excavation report. A working catalogue, not a souvenir.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAbu Simbel wasn’t finished for another year. This book already was.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSoftcover, illustrated colour covers · 20 × 23.5 cm · 205 pages · Black-and-white and colour illustrations throughout · Musée du Petit Palais, Paris, 1967\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eCondition:\u003c\/strong\u003e Good. Fine crazing across the laminated cover, a small chip at the top corner, light foxing and a faint vertical crease to the back board. Text and plates clean throughout.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Musée du Petit Palais","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54380410798418,"sku":null,"price":65.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0991\/5636\/1554\/files\/MuseeduPetitPalais_Paris_France_.Toutankhamonetsontempsexposition.1967.jpg?v=1787644904"}],"url":"https:\/\/thenewrare.com\/collections\/christiane-desroches-noblecourt.oembed","provider":"The New Rare","version":"1.0","type":"link"}