British Museum to bring back record-breaking Pompeii exhibition with screening of live event

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Zoe Paskett14 May 2020

The British Museum’s most popular exhibition of the last decade is set to return, in the form of an online broadcast.

Pompeii Live was the museum’s first live cinema event, giving an insight into the 2013 exhibition Life and death in Pompeii and Herculaneum. The programme will premiere for free on May 20 on YouTube and Facebook.

Former British Museum director and author of A History of the World in 100 Objects Neil MacGregor introduces the programme which features an expert line-up including new trustee Professor Mary Beard and historian Peter Snow.

The exhibition delved into the daily lives of the residents of Pompeii and Herculaneum, with the film adding elements of live performance including music, poetry and eye-witness accounts and insights into Pompeiian life in the gardens, kitchens and bedrooms.

Beard said: “Pompeii and Herculaneum let us shine a very bright and intriguing light onto the world of Ancient Rome, from its posh palaces to its mean streets, from the slaves to the grandees, from the luxurious dining to the cheap takeaways — and the sex and the lavatories!

“Of course we should never forget that the remains we now explore are the result of an appalling tragedy. But I have always thought that we owe it to the victims to bring their world back to life. The British Museum Exhibition and Live broadcast did that brilliantly.”

The 2013 exhibition attracted more than 471,000 visitors, making it the third most popular exhibition in the history of the museum. Pompeii Live was originally seen by nearly 54,000 people in cinemas.

A second live event Vikings Live, created for the 2014 exhibition Vikings: life and legend, will screen the following week on May 27.

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