Magical Encounters- Security Guards Art Included in Major Met Exhibition

Real-life encounters are extremely important. They enable the kind of serendipitous enhancements of our life that come about like this. I was visiting the American Wing about a year ago to specifically see Flight into Egypt by Henry Oswald Tanner. I was in a very dreamy headspace. I had decided to title my exhibition Project After This Painting. When I entered the American Wing, Armia Khalil kindly approached me. For me, it was just a normal day. I saw that visitor coming looking for a piece of art or whatever. Armia asked me if I needed directions to see anything in particular. When I said I wanted to see Flight into Egypt, he was very curious. Once he said Egypt, that was the magic word for me. And I told him, I'm Egyptian, by the way, and I'm an artist. So this is an ash tree. So when you see it from the back, it's like a tree. But when you move around, you see the details and the statue and all the sculpture from the front. I'm an artist. I work at the Metropolitan Museum of Art as a security officer. I was born in a small village in Egypt. Once I finished my art school, I found a job with a company copying ancient Egyptian artifacts. That was my training, to copy the ancient Egyptian and learn from them. It was a dream to come to New York, to America. In 2005, I won a lottery, actually, and a green card. I was really homesick when I moved here. I was trying to find an art job. When I visited the Met the first time, it was actually my first time to smile and be happy. After two months, I didn't expect to see a lot of Egyptian art. I was like, wow, look at this. This is Egypt. I found a treasure in New York here, the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I asked Armia to show me some of his work. He showed me his Instagram account, which had a really fascinating photo of his studio in 2005 in Cairo. That photograph reminded me of a photo of Met conservators working on Egyptian objects in maybe the 1930s or 40s. It was both a visceral and intellectual eureka moment. His face totally changed, actually. And his eyes were wide open. I still remember his face and that moment. He told me about the museum's plan and his plan for a big exhibit coming. And a few seconds later, he said, since you're an artist, would you like to participate in the exhibit? In my dreams, I never dreamed a moment like this. I know this gallery. I've been here, I would say, maybe 100 times as a security officer. I never thought I would one day be sitting like this, talking about a piece of art that was inspired by our Met collection. I was compelled to invite Armia to participate in Blight into Egypt because of the strength of his work. And I thought it was profoundly compelling that he was inspired by the work in the Met's collection, but also his own experience of growing up in Egypt. For me, it's a plus that Armia is a great colleague. And if he weren't such a friendly colleague, then maybe I would never have had the chance to speak to him. For curators, the lesson is to be open to the expertise of people working in different facets of your institution. The lesson for an aspiring artist would be to not be ashamed to show yourself. For me, magic happened after the Met. Magic happened here, yes.