Met Museum security guard and masonry worker display their own art in secret show

nypost.com:

Art Work: Artists Working at the Met” opened earlier this week at the famed museum and runs through Dec. 1. It features work by 640 staffers, from guards and technicians to conservators, librarians, and ticket-takers.

Here, seven of them tell us about their work.Armia Malak Khalil, Senior Security Officer (Security)“Ushabti (A Substitute for the Afterlife),” 2024 Khalil grew up in Egypt surrounded by sculpture. “It’s everywhere,” the 45-year-old said. “I studied classical painting, but I taught myself sculpture copying the Ancient Egyptians.”He first came to the US in 2006.

He had no family, no friends, no connections, but eventually found a community of Coptic Christians from Egypt living in Jersey City. “I started doing some wood carving for the church there,” he said. “The priest let me use a corner of the basement for my art.”He began working as a security guard at the Met in 2009 and continued making sculptures inspired by his Egyptian heritage.

He based the plasticine figurine in this show on the Ushabti — statuettes that were buried next to the deceased to help them in the afterlife. “There were about 401 of them in each tomb, and I loved the idea of making my own with different materials,” said Khalil, who also has a gorgeous wooden bust, “Hope,” in another Met show, “Flight Into Egypt,” on view through Feb.