With their pyramids and elaborate funerary rituals, ancient Egyptians appeared to have been obsessed with death, but an exhibition seeks to show that it was their love of life that drove them to seek immortality.

"Quest For Immortality: The World of Ancient Egypt" made its debut in Singapore yesterday, with some 230 antiquities.

"Everybody thinks ancient Egypt was mummies, pyramids and Tutankhamun, but there was a daily life too, and that's what we tried to show," curator Michaela Huettner said.