In November, Major Exhibition Brings Unprecedented Loans of Roman Antiquities to the U.S. from the Renowned Collections of Italian Museums

Art and Life in Imperial Rome: Trajan and His Times

The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and Saint Louis Art Museum will present majestic marble sculptures and vivid frescoes, along with elegant mosaics, delicate glass vessels, and exquisite bronze artifacts, to vividly chronicle life at the height of Rome’s empire.

HOUSTON and ST. LOUIS—June 11, 2025—Today, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and the Saint Louis Museum of Art announced an exhibition partnership that will bring unprecedented loans to the United States from the renowned antiquities collections of Italian museums. The exhibition will debut at the MFAH in November 2025 and will be presented at SLAM in March 2026.

The extensive presentation brings to life the extraordinary reign of Trajan, who ruled the Roman Empire at its height; it is the first major exhibition in the United States dedicated to Trajan and his era.

“This is truly a rare opportunity for U.S. audiences to experience spectacular objects from this glorious era of the Roman Empire,” commented Gary Tinterow, director and Margaret Alkek Williams chair of the MFAH. “We are enormously grateful to our colleagues in Rome, Naples, and Vatican City for lending these treasures to us and broadening the appreciation of Italy’s cultural heritage.”

“The art and architecture of ancient Rome continues to inspire awe and ignite curiosity,” said Min Jung Kim, the Barbara B. Taylor Director of the Saint Louis Art Museum. “We are fortunate to present an exhibition that is underpinned by thoughtful scholarship and magnificent loans from many of Italy’s finest public collections.”

Trajan commanded the Roman Empire between 98 and 117 CE. A soldier-emperor, he was the second of the so-called “Five Good Emperors” of the Nerva-Antonine dynasty; his military and imperial successes launched him to popular fame. Born Marcus Ulpius Traianus into an elite family in what is now Andalusia, Spain, Trajan became the first of Rome’s emperors born outside of present-day Italy. As emperor, he granted citizenship and the rights that came with it to people from the far-reaching provinces that his forces conquered, expanding and fundamentally changing the concept of what it meant to be Roman.

The exhibition will explore how art was used during Trajan’s era: privately, in the houses of the elite, and publicly, in the forums and public buildings as propaganda to promote the empire’s values as it was expanded to its greatest extent. The objects on view will tell the many stories—cultural, social, political, and economic—of life in imperial Rome, immersing visitors in the majesty of Trajan’s world at the turn of the second century CE. Featured will be rarely displayed marble portrait busts and statues of the men and women who shaped the Roman world of Trajan’s dynasty, as well as vivid frescoes and ornate furnishings from the villas of Pompeii. Lending historical and visual context to these remarkable artworks in Houston will be a re-creation of a section of Trajan’s Column—a towering pillar with a spiraling narrative frieze that is one of the few monumental sculptures to have survived the fall of Rome. Its 155 scenes and 2,662 carved figures depict two major campaigns against the Dacian kingdom between 102 and 106 CE, Trajan’s crowning military triumph; the vignettes unfold in a frieze the length of the 100-foot column.

The exhibition features some 160 objects, many on view in the United States for the first time. Lenders include the Museo Nazionale Romano, the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, the Parco Archeologico di Ostia, and the Musei Vaticani.

Organization and Funding
The exhibition—in Houston, Art and Life in Imperial Rome: Trajan and His Times and in St. Louis, Ancient Splendor: Roman Art in the Time of Trajan—is curated by Dr. Lucrezia Ungaro, former director of the Imperial Forums Museum, Rome.

At Houston, the exhibition is co‐organized by StArt and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and is on view at the MFAH from November 2, 2025, through January 25, 2026.

At St. Louis, the exhibition is co-organized by StArt and the Saint Louis Art Museum, where it will be on view from March 14 to August 16, 2026.

Lead foundation underwriting is provided by:

Major support is provided by:
Jerold B. Katz Foundation

Generous support is provided by:
The Favrot Fund
Consulate General of Italy in Houston and The Italian Cultural Institute in Los Angeles

About the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
Spanning 14 acres in the heart of Houston’s Museum District, the main campus comprises the Audrey Jones Beck Building, the Caroline Wiess Law Building, the Lillie and Hugh Roy Cullen Sculpture Garden and the Nancy and Rich Kinder Building. Nearby, two house museums—Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens, and Rienzi—present collections of American and European decorative arts. The MFAH is also home to the Glassell School of Art, with its Core Residency Program and Junior and Studio schools; and the International Center for the Arts of the Americas (ICAA), a leading research institute for 20th-century Latin American and Latino art. www.mfah.org

About the Saint Louis Art Museum
The Saint Louis Art Museum is one of the nation’s leading comprehensive art museums with collections that include works of art of exceptional quality from virtually every culture and time period. Areas of notable depth include Oceanic art, ancient American art, ancient Chinese bronzes, and European and American art of the late 19th and 20th centuries, with particular strength in 20th-century German art. Admission to the Saint Louis Art Museum is free to all every day. www.slam.org

Images (left to right): Statue of Trajan, Minturno, Italy, 2nd century, marble, National Archaeological Museum, Naples. Mosaic Pavement with Fish, House of the Severi, Rome, Italy, 2nd century, mosaic, National Roman Museum, Rome. Unfinished Statue of a Dacian, Via Dei Coronari, Rome, Italy, beginning of the 2nd century, marble, Gregorian Profane Museum, Vatican Museums, Vatican City. Statue of Sabina as Ceres, the Baths of Neptune, Ostia, Italy, 2nd century, marble, Archaeological Park of Ostia Antica, Rome.