An ancient child mummy owned by the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford has been carefully transported to London for a new art exhibition.

The 3ft mummy of an infant boy has been housed by the museum in Beaumont Street since it was excavated in Egypt by a British archaeologist in 1888.

But now, after a trip down the M40 in a specially-built case, the mummy is at the centre of artist Angela Palmer's exhibition Unravelled, which runs until June 12.

Unravelled includes more than 20 works by the mother-of-three, who trained at the Ruskin College of Drawing and Fine Art in Oxford.

Mrs Palmer drew slices of the head and body on multiple sheets of glass, to create a three-dimensional image of the body.

Mrs Palmer, a former journalist, went to great lengths to ensure her research was accurate and even took the mummy to the John Radcliffe Hospital, where a scan discovered it was a boy.

She said: "Over the past two years, I have watched the child's body slowly and intriguingly turn into a three-dimensional shape in my studio, using details from the 2,500 scans from the John Radcliffe.

"I began to feel an eerie closeness to the child and felt compelled to visit the tomb where he lay for nearly 2,000 years before being taken to Oxford.

"My work is a marriage of science and art and it has been a fascinating project."

While visiting the burial site, she filled her water bottle with sand, which forms part of the exhibition.

The images are being displayed at the Waterhouse & Dodd gallery in Cork Street, London, but are not for sale, and will be given to the Ashmolean after the exhibition ends.