page_title: Art of ancient Egypt
section_title: Egyptian Revival art
hierarchical_section_title: Art of ancient Egypt / Egyptian Revival art
caption_attribution_description: English: Building at # 2 Place du Cairo", an 1828 building on a passage also known as the Faire du Caire built in 1798 in place of the convent of the "Filles de la Charité". The name comes from the campaign in Egypt of Napoleon. The distinctive Hathor head sculptures and egyptian drawings were designed by J. G. Garraud&#160;: 2 Place du Caire, Paris 2nd arr. Français&#160;: Lotissement appelé "Foire du Caire" construit en 1798 à l'emplacement du couvent des filles de la charité. Et nommé ainsi en souvenir de la campagne d'Égypte. Sculpteur Prétrel avec des têtes et des motifs égyptiens&#160;: 2 Place du Caire, Paris 2e arr.
context_page_description: Ancient Egyptian art refers art produced in ancient Egypt between the 31st century BC and the 4th century AD. It includes paintings, sculptures, drawings on papyrus, faience, jewelry, ivories, architecture, and other art media. It is also very conservative: the art style changed very little over time. Much of the surviving art comes from tombs and monuments, giving more insight into the ancient Egyptian afterlife beliefs.
  The ancient Egyptian language had no word for "art". Artworks served an essentially functional purpose that was bound with religion and ideology. To render a subject in art was to give it permanence. Hence, ancient Egyptian art portrayed an idealized, unrealistic view of the world. There was no significant tradition of individual artistic expression since art served a wider and cosmic purpose of maintaining order.
context_section_description: Egyptian Revival art is a style in Western art, mainly of the early nineteenth century, in which Egyptian motifs were applied to a wide variety of decorative arts objects. It was underground in American decorative arts throughout the nineteenth century, continuing into the 1920s. The major motifs of Egyptian art, such as obelisks, hieroglyphs, the sphinx, and pyramids, were used in various artistic media, including architecture, furniture, ceramics, and silver. Egyptian motifs provided an exotic alternative to the more traditional styles of the day. Over the course of the nineteenth century, American tastes evolved from a highly ornamented aesthetic to a simpler, sparer sense of decoration; the vocabulary of ancient Egyptian art would be interpreted and adapted in different ways depending on the standards and motivations of the time.
  Enthusiasm for the artistic style of Ancient Egypt is generally attributed to the excitement over Napoleon's conquest of Egypt and, in Britain, to Admiral Nelson's defeat of Napoleon at the Battle of the Nile in 1798. Napoleon took a scientific expedition with him to Egypt. Publication of the expedition's work, the Description de l'Égypte, began in 1809 and came out in a series though 1826, inspiring everything from sofas with Sphinxes for legs, to tea sets painted with the pyramids. It was the popularity of the style that was new, Egyptianizing works of art had appeared in scattered European settings from the time of the Renaissance.
caption: Foire du Caire building (1828), from Paris, an early manifestation of Egyptian Revivalism: façade adorned with heads of the Egyptian goddess Hathor
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