With works spanning more than 2,000 years, “Nubia: Treasures of Ancient Africa” will provide insights into the long and glorious past of the kingdoms that inhabited the Nile River valley in what is today Sudan. The exhibition opens at the Saint Louis Art Museum on April 18.

The ancient Nubians established vast trade networks that reached across the Mediterranean into Greece and Rome and far into central Africa. At the time that Nubian kings conquered neighboring Egypt in the 8th century B.C., they controlled one of the largest empires of the ancient world. Yet for many people today, this powerful history remains little known.

Through a majestic display of art and objects, “Nubia: Treasures of Ancient Africa” offers new ways of understanding Nubia’s history and contemporary relevance. Using magnificent jewelry, pottery, sculpture, metalwork and more, the exhibition examines concepts of power, representation and cultural bias as relevant in the ancient world as they are today.

All objects in the exhibition are drawn from the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), which also organized the exhibition. The core of this collection of ancient Nubian art was formed between 1913 and 1932, when the museum partnered with Harvard University on the first scientific excavations of Nubian sites.

“This stunning exhibition is based on scholarship and objects of exceptional quality,” says Brent R. Benjamin, the Barbara B. Taylor Director of the Saint Louis Art Museum. “Because of the extraordinary collection and curatorial expertise of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, ‘Nubia: Treasures of Ancient Africa’ is a project we were eager to bring to St. Louis.”

The exhibition is curated by Denise Doxey, Curator of Ancient Egyptian, Nubian, and Near Eastern Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. It is presented in St. Louis by the Betsy and Thomas Patterson Foundation. Additional support is provided by the E. Desmond Lee Family Endowment for Exhibitions; the Missouri Arts Council, a state agency; and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Tickets are available starting March 30 in person at the museum, or through MetroTix, which charges a service fee. Tickets are $12 for adults, $10 for seniors and students, and $6 for children aged 6 to 12. Tickets are free for museum members. The exhibition will run through August 22.

The Saint Louis Art Museum is one of the nation’s leading comprehensive art museums with collections that include works of art of exceptional quality from virtually every culture and time period. Areas of notable depth include Oceanic art, pre-Columbian art, ancient Chinese bronzes and European and American art of the late 19th and 20th centuries, with particular strength in 20th-century German art. Admission to the Saint Louis Art Museum is free to all every day. For more information, call 314.721.0072 or visit slam.org.