BACK TO THE PAST. Narrative and storytelling learning in a digital modeling reconstruction process

This essay describes the most recent and novel results of the fruitful collaboration between Politecnico di Torino and Fondazione Museo delle Antichità Egizie, in Turin. The reconstructive digital modelling of some of the Museum’s halls constitutes a virtual environment that is useful in remotely and interactively showing some previous exhibitions of the collection named ‘Travel models of Egyptian architectures’ by Jean Jacques Rifaud. The collection was recorded from the time of its arrival in Italy until 1967, at the event of the Pirelli Exhibition in Milan. The maquettes are preserved at the Egyptian Museum but to date, only a small portion is exhibited, and most wooden models are kept in the deposits of the museum. Historical research has allowed us to collect the blueprints containing the layout of the artefacts displayed in the exhibits of the past. This has resulted in immersive navigation of the topologically reconstructed space that provides an active interaction with the digitized models.