In conjunction with the Promenades on Paper exhibition, Liza Oliver, associate professor of art at Wellesley College, discusses the Description de l’Égypte (1809–1820)—a monumental compilation of engravings and essays about the pharaonic past, modern state, and natural history of Egypt that ushered in the discipline of modern Egyptology as we know it. Born out of Napoleon’s violent occupation of the country in 1798, the Description de l’Égypte highlights the close connection between Enlightenment-inspired classification projects and Europe’s imperial and colonial ambitions of the period.

Free.

Image: Rare Book Division, The New York Public Library. "Frontispiece, vol. 1" The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1809.