Museum Pieces - Lady Tjepu

Courtesy of Brooklyn Museum

LADY TJEPU

One of the most remarkable paintings to survive from ancient Egypt, this depiction at the noblewoman Tjepu came from a tomb built for her son Nebamun and a man named lpuky. Egyptian artists usually did not depict individuals as they truly looked, but rather as eternally youthful, lavishly dressed, and in an attitude of repose.

Tjepu was about forty years old when this painting was executed, but she is shown in what was the height of youthful fashion during the reign of Amunhotep III: a perfumed cone on her heavy wig, a delicate side tress, and a semitransparent, fringed linen dress.

Medium: Limestone, gessoed and painted
Place Excavated: Thebes, Egypt
Dates: ca. 1390-1353 B.C.E.
Dynasty: XVIII Dynasty
Period: New Kingdom
Dimensions: 14 13/16 x 9 7/16 in. (37.6 x 24 cm)  (show scale)
Collections:Egyptian, Classical, Ancient Near Eastern Art
Museum Location: This item is on view in Egypt Reborn: Art for Eternity, Egyptian Orientation Gallery, 3rd Floor
Accession Number: 65.197
Credit Line: Charles Edwin Wilbour Fund

Source: http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/3743/Lady_Tjepu