Art from Pompeii and Herculaneum can be seen in the Drents Museum from 20 November. In the exhibition Dying in Beauty – The World of Pompeii and Herculaneum include frescoes and statues from the cities buried by a volcanic eruption.
In AD 79, the port cities were buried under a layer of ash and lava during the eruption of Vesuvius. “As a result, they became the best-preserved cities from Roman times. Since the eighteenth century, archaeologists have uncovered large parts,” writes the Drents Museum in the announcement of the new exhibition. The finds are part of the collections of the Museo Archeologico Nazionale in Naples and the Parco Archeologico di Ercolano in Herculaneum.
The Drents Museum borrows more than a hundred art treasures from Italian museums. “The exhibition focuses on life before the eruption. Beauty and art were important to the Romans and that is reflected in the exhibition,” the museum writes. “On display are personal items such as crockery and jewelry, as well as the statues, frescoes, mosaics and fountains with which rich and poor alike decorated their homes and gardens.”
One of the highlights of the exhibition, which can be seen until March 26, 2023, is the mural from a house in Pompeii from the 1st century BC, by baker Terentius Neo and his wife. “Beauty played a major role in the formation of identity with the Romans. They allowed themselves to be depicted in an idealized form on frescoes, with fashionable clothing on, in a chic environment.”
Dying in beauty is the successor of the archeology exhibition Under the spell of the Ararat – Treasures from ancient Armenia. That exhibition won the exhibition prize of the Museum Magazine this week and can be seen until 30 October.