Exhibition to bring Roman empire to Bristol Museum and Art Gallery

Treasures from the British Museum and Bristol's own collection will 'allow visitors to get close to Roman ancestors'Upstairs at the Bristol Museum and Art Gallery what look like rough clumps of rubble have been laid out on the floor in a rough circle.At first glance it might perhaps be some kind of contemporary sculpture – an artwork contemplating the friability and fragility of the material world, perhaps – until closer inspection reveals it to be a Roman mosaic, badly broken up, and then pieced back together.Only a keen eye may detect its once fine design. Orpheus, the great musician of myth, sits at its centre strumming a lyre, while a fox leaps at his feet. Around him circle animals − entranced by his glorious music − a bull, a stag, a leopard, a lion, a hind, a bear. They are interspersed with trees: even they, according to the poet Ovid's account of the tale, were held spellbound by his song.The mosaic, found at Newton St Loe during the building of the Bath to Bristol railway in 1837, is nearly 2,000 years old and showing its age. It has recently been jigsawed together and displayed for only the second time in its history after it was pickaxed from a wall of Keynsham railway station in 1851. Now it provides a poignant taster of a major new British Museum touring exhibition that opens in Bristol on 21 September.Following the success of the museum's Pompeii and Herculaneum show, which has been visited by 390,000 people so far, this latest exhibition, Roman Empire...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - Category: Science Authors: Tags: theguardian.com Museums Art Culture News Archaeology Sculpture Bristol Exhibitions UK news Art and design Source Type: news