Study and Curriculum Ideas

A Fusion of Worlds is an exploration of the ways in which modernist artists - in particular Jacob Epstein, Edna Manley and Ronald Moody - were inspired by Ancient Egypt. This web version of the exhibition can be used to support GCE History and Geography units (A/AS Level), a source for personal investigation at GCE Art & Design or in supplementary schools for the study of Black cultural, artistic and political histories. It can also be used for self study and interest.

The relevant section of the exhibition is shown connected to the specific units of GCE exam board below and a link is also given on the specific web page. These support the new exam board curriculum being taught from September 2015 and (for A Level) examined in June 2017. This web resource can be used to cover:

• The cultural relationship of human populations locally (London) and globally (specifically between Britain / America / Egypt / Jamaica).
• How migration and population change can affect ideas around personal and political identity.
• How population change and colonialism affects the cultural and social character of urban areas and growth of and connections between 'world cities'.
• The context for the creation of art works and the influence of the past on present cultural forms of production.
• Understanding how different identities are formed within society as well as social, ethnic and cultural diversity.
• Provides links and comparisons across different periods and aspects of the past.
• Promotes critical and reflective approaches to evidence; illustrates how historical judgements and artistic analysis are formed.

Specific sections to exam board curriculum include:

• Edexcel AS / A Level Geography. Unit 4. Geographical Research Option 4. The World of Cultural Diversity. Ancient Egypt: Display & Reception explores the complex concept of culture, how human cultures vary and cultural patterns. The map [link] and Jacob Epstein: A London Walk can be specifically used to understand the idea of geographies of culture, specifically within London and how urban landscapes can be imagined and mapped.
• OCR A Level History. Unit Group 3. Thematic Study and Historical Interpretations. Y320 From Colonialism to Independence: The British Empire 1857 - 1965. 'Opposition to British Rule', context for Pan Africanism, the impact of imperial power on the periphery & Britain (Orientalism, the arts, exhibitions and metropolitan politics) in Egypt in Modernist Britain, Harlem Renaissance, Edna Manley, Ronald Moody and Mahmoud Mukhtar: Egypt Awakened.
• OCR A Level History. Unit Group 3. Thematic Study and Historical Interpretations. Y319 Civil Rights in the USA 1865 - 1992. The 'role of African Americans in gaining civil rights' and changing position within society, with a link to people involved such as W.E.B. DuBois in The Harlem Renaissance.
• OCR A Level History. Unit Group 3. Thematic Study and Historical Interpretations. Y321 The Middle East 1908 - 2011: Ottomans to Arab Spring. The role of the 'Great Powers' in the Middle East - Britain in Egypt: problems and policy in British Egypt. Some background to Nasserism and Arab nationalism in Mahmoud Mukhtar: Egypt Awakened.