Overview

“Impressions of Alexandria” is a collection of original engravings, lithographs and maps that reveal artists and travelers, impressions of Alexandria from the 15^th to the 19^th centuries. It also includes rare photographs of the city from the early 19^th century to the mid-20^th century, and highlights the cultural life in the cosmopolitan city as portrayed by its prominent writers and artists. The Exhibition is therefore a vivid documentation of the “city, half-imagined (yet wholly real)”, as Durrell describes it in The Alexandria Quartet.

Light House “Pharos” of  Alexandria by Fisher von Erlach,1721

"Impressions of Alexandria" is a permanent exhibition from Dr. Mohamed Awad’s personal collection. Educated at Victoria College, Alexandria, Dr. Mohamed Awad is a lecturer at the Faculty of Engineering (Alexandria University), a practicing architect, historian and founder of the Alexandria Preservation Trust.

Part of the Exhibition

Alexandria as seen by Artists and Travelers Principal port of entry into Egypt, Alexandria’s fabled past attracted many European artists and explorers of the middle ages. Though they explored its more... antique ruins, many were none too impressed by the deteriorated state of the city.
Alexandria in the Chronicle of Nuremberg by Hartmann Schedel, 1493
Cosmopolitan Alexandria A Photographic Memory The collection of photographs and postcards captures cosmopolitan Alexandria’s belle époque, more... from the early 19th century to the mid 20th century.
Mohamed Ali’s Harem palace at Ras El Tin, a daguerreotype by Frédéric Goupil-Fesquet taken on 7 Nov 1839, is probably the first photograph in Egypt and Africa