Melbourne Museum secures King Tut

Melbourne has beaten interstate rivals to secure a major exhibition about Tutankhamun, Egypt's most famous Pharaoh.

The Melbourne Museum will host Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs in April 2011. Up to 700,000 people are expected to visit the blockbuster exhibition which showcases 50 of King Tutankhamunâs burial objects and 80 more treasures unearthed from Egyptian tombs in the Valley of the Kings.

Melbourne Museum Chief Executive Dr Patrick Greene explained that "this is going to truly be a once-in a lifetime experience (it will be) the biggest, the greatest exhibition of all time, right here in Melbourne."

A National Geographic exhibition, Tutankhamun has already been seen by seven million people worldwide.

Melbourne Museum was chosen as the exclusive Australian venue because of its success with blockbusters such as 2009's A Day in Pompeii, which had 332,679 visitors, and Titanic: The Artefact Exhibition which has attracted 430,000 people so far and ends this weekend.

Mark Lach, the show's creative director, said from New York that "we have been so impressed with the professionalism and the enthusiasm your museum has shown."

The Golden Age of the Pharaohs explores the regal figures who guided ancient Egypt 3,000 thousand years ago.

It reveals an age when Egypt was at the height of its power and presents colossal statues, elaborate furniture and glittering jewellery in a series of spectacularly lit chambers.

Lach added "there are amazing discoveries at every turn - just as there were for (archaeologist) Howard Carter who discovered Tut's tomb (in November 1922)."

After Melbourne, the exhibits from host Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs will return to the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

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