The emperor Caesar Augustus stands tall in marble, arm lifted in timeless command, his draped toga falling in folds as precise as the lines of his jaw. Two thousand years ago, this statue proclaimed the authority of Rome\u2019s first emperor to subjects across a vast empire \u2014 today, it speaks to Texans about power, propaganda, and endurance. Augustus is one of fifty-eight treasures from the Torlonia Collection now on view at the Kimbell Art Museum in \u201cMyth & Marble: Ancient Roman Sculpture from the Torlonia Collection,\u201d a once-in-a-generation exhibition running Sept. 14 through Jan. 25, 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis collection is legendary,\u201d said Eric M. Lee, the Kimbell\u2019s director. \u201cFor decades it was locked away, unseen even by most scholars. The sculptures you\u2019re about to see were made two thousand years ago, the same era as the Colosseum and the Pantheon, and yet they still carry an astonishing vitality.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Torlonia Collection\u2019s story is nearly as dramatic as the empire it reflects. In the nineteenth century, Prince Giovanni Torlonia and his son Alessandro assembled what became known as a \u201ccollection of collections,\u201d acquiring entire groups of Roman marbles through excavation and purchase. A private museum opened in 1876, but after World War II, it shuttered, and for nearly eighty years, the marbles were stored away. Only in recent years have they reemerged, dazzling audiences first in Rome, then in Paris, and now, improbably, in Fort Worth.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For Alessandro Poma Murialdo, president of Fondazione Torlonia, the Texas debut is more than a cultural milestone. \u201cIt is a true honor to be here today in Fort Worth,\u201d he said. \u201cFor us, it\u2019s more than an exhibition \u2014 it\u2019s a dialogue between cultures and between centuries.\u201d He stressed that the foundation\u2019s mission is not just to preserve but to revive. \u201cThese marvels, unseen for so long, are now at the center of an unprecedented international journey, one that we hope will renew their relevance for new audiences and new generations.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Jennifer Casler Price, the Kimbell\u2019s senior curator of Asian, African, and Ancient American art, placed the sculptures back in their ancient context. \u201cRome was vast, stretching from Britain to Africa to Asia Minor. Most of its people were illiterate, so statues became the way emperors broadcast power, gods inspired worship, and citizens recognized their place in the world. It was visual culture as communication, the billboards of the ancient empire.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Casler Price also reminded audiences that these works bear the imprint of centuries of restoration. Renaissance and Baroque collectors disliked fragments, so missing limbs and faces were often reimagined, sometimes by masters like Bernini, sometimes by lesser hands stitching marble from other works. To help modern viewers decode that history, the exhibition includes diagrams showing what\u2019s original, what\u2019s an ancient repair, and what\u2019s a later addition.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In the end, \u201cMyth & Marble\u201d is not only about stone; it\u2019s about survival. As Murialdo observed, \u201cWe believe that classical sculpture, though rooted in antiquity, is defined by its capacity for renewal. These sculptures remind us of enduring human values \u2014 resilience, beauty, and dignity.\u201d In the cool light of the Renzo Piano Pavilion, standing eye to eye with Augustus himself, those values feel as alive in Texas as they once did in Rome.\u00a0<\/p>\n
September 10, 2025<\/p>\n
3:37 PM<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The emperor Caesar Augustus stands tall in marble, arm lifted in timeless command, his draped toga falling in…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":218310,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5138],"tags":[5229,119190,12043,28063,7371,7372,40401,10674,10763,358,7453,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-218309","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fort-worth","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-ancient","10":"tag-arts-and-culture","11":"tag-exhibit","12":"tag-fort-worth","13":"tag-fortworth","14":"tag-kimbell-art-museum","15":"tag-sculptures","16":"tag-stephen-montoya","17":"tag-texas","18":"tag-top-story","19":"tag-tx","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-united-states-of-america","22":"tag-unitedstates","23":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","24":"tag-us","25":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115186017688953828","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218309","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218309"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218309\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/218310"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218309"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218309"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218309"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}