The National Museum announced recently it will be bringing a major exhibition of artifacts from ancient Greece to the Australian capital next year, capping off a series of shows featuring objects from the British Museum.
In keeping with the Olympic theme for 2020, the show, titled “Ancient Greeks: Athletes, Warriors and Heroes” will feature 170 objects exploring the theme of competition through sports, politics, drama, music and warfare.
National Museum director Mathew Trinca said many of the works in this show have never before been displayed in the southern hemisphere.
“I think it would be fair to say that the British Museum places particular store on its ongoing relationship with the National Museum,” he told interviewers from the Canberra Times.
Trinca said among the standout objects would be a marble study for one of one of the best-known Greek athletic statues, the “Dior Dionis,” a bust of the playwright Euripides, and a terracotta vase with finely-drawn depictions of athletes.
Trinca said the vase had served as the ancient equivalent of today’s Olympic gold medal.
“This would have been filled with olive oil and given to the victor of the Athenian Games as a prize, and it dates from the 4th century BC,” he said.
“We are delighted to bring Ancient Greeks to east coast audiences, who I know will be mesmerised by the stories of competition in the ancient Greek world and by the beautiful depictions of athletes, the ceramics, sculptures, armour and jewelry featured in the show,” he added.
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