Yesterday in Canberra, the Australian National Museum's exhibition dedicated to Pompeii, 'the lost city' - now a Unesco cultural heritage site -, destroyed and made immortal by the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 A.D., was inaugurated. A heterogeneous audience took part in the launching ceremony: in addition to the Governor General of the Commonwealth of Australia, the Hon. Sam Mostyn, some of the main representatives of the local diplomatic community, as well as the various expressions of Canberra's civil society, were present. Three officials who oversee the educational and international promotion projects of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii also reached the Australian capital from Italy. At the invitation of the Director of the National Museum, Katherine McMahon, the Italian Ambassador to Australia, Paolo Crudele, welcomed the guests and officially opened the exhibition, which will be open from today until next May.
Embellished with ninety objects from the Archaeological Park of the famous Italian site and from the Grand Palais Immersif in Paris, the exhibition recounts fragments of life (aggregated and intimate), rituals and social norms of the time when Pompeii was, in its multicultural nature, a crossroads for the circulation of goods, people and knowledge in the Mediterranean. An immersive itinerary, which stimulates the senses through light and sound and re-proposes to the visitor (at regular intervals) the destructive and creative energy of that volcanic eruption that marked the destiny of the Neapolitan city. The Italian Embassy has also contributed to the production of the series of events that will accompany the exhibition, and will soon host a scientific-dissemination panel dedicated to Pompeii at the Residence.
"It is an honour and an immense pleasure for me to inaugurate the exhibition at the National Museum, supported by the Embassy of Italy: a unique opportunity to capture the essence of Pompeii in its grandeur, eternity and fragility," said Ambassador Crudele. "Pompeii's frescoes, statues and mosaics restore to us an originality and artistic richness that owe much to the Greco-Roman influence. But Pompeii is also an architectural and social model that transcends the ages and has left its mark on the urban design of many contemporary cities. Through this extraordinary occasion of cultural promotion of our country in Australia, we celebrate a 'living the Italian way' that has its humanistic roots in our great past and that today is an interpreter of the construction of a global and shared future".
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