CAIRO — When Jason Combs was hired five years ago to appraise items at the Junk Jaunt in Cairo, he didn’t know he was about to unbox an adventure. Old Cairo photos find new life in print Skip ...

But El Massry, 29, an Egyptian photographer, art director and film production designer based in Cairo, thought he could do better. "It was nice, but it wasn't my favorite photo I've ever taken.

Photos: Egypt’s 3,400-Year-Old ‘Lost Golden City’ Is Unearthed From Desert Sands. ... professor of Egyptology at the American University in Cairo, ... (Photo by Mahmoud Khaled) Getty Images.

Thursday night, Getty’s photography will make its formal debut at the Leila Heller Gallery in New York as part of the Land Art Road Trip show (on display through January 10), curated by Gerson Zevi.

After decades of being closed to visitors, a part of the Babylon fort located within the façade of the Coptic Museum in Old Cairo was inaugurated on Sunday.

These images, taken between 1900 and 1936, reveal what everyday life was like in Cairo at a time when it was rapidly expanding, and also show off its timeless tourism appeal.

IN PICTURES: Last week hundreds of people were killed after Egypt's military-backed interim government sent forces in to disperse protest camps of Morsi supporters in Cairo.