When visiting Spain I was pleasantly surprised when I came across the exhibition Tea with Nefertiti at IVAM -the Institut Valencià d’Art Modern. Curated by Sam Bardaouil and Till Fellratht and was originally shown at Mathaf, Arab Museum of Modern Art in Doha and l’Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris.

Tea with Nefertiti follows the current trend of exhibition methodology where works of art retrieved mainly from the hosting museums archives are placed in juxtapositions with either new work by contemporary artists or the museums permanent exhibition -such as at the Prado, the V&A or as here from the Egyptian Museum Collections/the metaphor of the bust of Nefertiti. The large exhibition benefits from it´s non-chronological mix of time periods and geographic placement. This “confusion” urges you as a viewer to even further consider the connection between the art work / the artist and the theme proposed by the curators. A perfect example is the “ceramics section” that show Ai Weiwei´s Coco-Cola vase from 1997, Grayson Perry´s Wise Alan ceramic sculpture from 2007 right next to a Lusterware Bowl, Fatimid from the 10th Century. My absolute favourite was Vik Muniz´s life size Tupperware sarcophagus that made me laugh out loud!