London Antiquities Dealership to Showcase Rediscovered Egyptian Masterpiece at Frieze Masters
London, UK- On Wednesday, September 10, 2025, London antiquities dealership David Aaron Ltd announced their exciting exhibition at this year’s Frieze Masters. From October 15 to 19 at The Regent’s Park in London, UK, attendees will have the opportunity to view a remarkable rediscovery- a masterfully carved Egyptian statue that has been overlooked and misattributed for many years.
Entitled “A Goddess Rediscovered,” the exhibition will feature a powerful and enigmatic bust of A Goddess by the Greywacke Master, carved from a fine dark stone called metagreywacke. The piece, dated to the reign of Amasis II (570–526 B.C.), Dynasty XXVI, has recently emerged from obscurity to claim its rightful place as one of the finest Egyptian sculptures of its kind in private hands today.
For over forty years, this stunning head, with its serene features and striated wig, remained hidden in a private collection. It resurfaced at a Gloucestershire auction in 2022, but its unusually preserved nose and shiny surface led some to dismiss it as a later imitation. Its earliest known provenance was its appearance in a Christie’s sale in 1978.
However, a forensic investigation by the team at David Aaron Ltd, along with scientists, conservators, and Egyptologists, has rewritten the sculpture’s story. Through their work, earlier documented provenance was discovered, as well as a detailed journey from Wadi Hammamat where the stone was quarried, to damage through iconoclasm, restoration practices in 18th-century Italy, and its appearance on the Parisian art market in 1923.
Salomon Aaron, Director of David Aaron Ltd, describes the sculpture as having “many stories,” including its ancient origins in Egypt, the resulting iconoclasm from the end of the Dynasty, and its restoration in 18th-century Italy. He explains, “Now, by removing those additions, we can see the original goddess and Egyptian masterpiece emerge once again.”
Advanced material analysis, including optical petrography, SEM imaging, and X-ray spectrometry, has confirmed the stone as Egyptian metagreywacke, highly prized for sculptures of royal and divine figures in the Late Period. A study of toolmarks revealed how a section from the back of the original statue was reworked into a replacement nose during the 18th century, as the original was lost in antiquity. This restoration, while impressive at the time, is now outdated and has caused doubts about the sculpture’s authenticity for a generation.
The goddess figure, once covered in wax, pigment, and speculation, has now been professionally de-restored, with the 18th-century nose sympathetically reattached. Recent scholarship has even linked the bust to a known corpus of works attributed to an ancient Egyptian workshop or artist known as the “Greywacke Master.”
“A Goddess Rediscovered” will be the highlight of David Aaron’s stand at Frieze Masters 2025, located at stand C02. The exhibition invites curators, collectors, and scholars to engage with an object that bridges thousands of years of artistic tradition, restoration history, and connoisseurship.
For more information or to schedule an interview, please contact Salomon Aaron at sa@davidaaron.com. Images and a full dossier are available upon request.
Distributed by https://pressat.co.uk/
