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Editor in Chief Mohamed Wadie

Get to Know More about Avenue of Sphinxes' Opening Designs


Sun 05 Dec 2021 | 08:38 PM
Ali Abu Dashish

Unforgettable Luxor's Avenue of Sphinxes opening held on November 25th, designs were inspired by the Opet ceremony that was organized back in the times of Ancient Egypt.

However, all designs were not taken identically as today's artists blended slight changes to the original formats with keeping the vibe of the ancient sent.

Mohamed Atiya, the main designer of the parade and Mohamed Hamaki's featured song scenes, said that the process of designing the parade was inspired by the writings of Luxor Temple that narrated the whole details of the parade's route and rituals.

Regarding the three sacred boats, they were taken from the holy trio of Amun, Mut, and Khenso, the gods whom Opet dedicated to. But, the sizes of the new celebration's boats were somehow 14-meter high for each, compared to the original five-meter high boats of Ancient Egypt, to be spotted by the cinematic cameras.

Atiya added that all accessories and lanterns were placed to be on the parade's both sides to imitate the Ancient Egyptian style, the same went with the costumes of the dancers, performers, musicians, artists to be similar to the Ancient Egyptian Opet participants appearances.

Moreover, he explained that the first stage before Luxor Temple and took the shape of the sun, while the other stage before The Ramesseum Temple was designed on the shape of Ankh.

Regarding the performance of the holy lake at Al Karnak temples, he revealed that the execution of the stage was so complex as it took seven days of work as the wooden stage was established beneath the water to create harmony between the dancers on the stage and the water, asserting that some of Opet celebrations were performed inside floating boats in the Nile, and the others were on the land.

Contributed by: Rana Atef