The emperor Caesar Augustus stands tall in marble, arm lifted in timeless command, his draped toga falling in folds as precise as the lines of his jaw. Two thousand years ago, this statue proclaimed the authority of Rome’s first emperor to subjects across a vast empire — today, it speaks to Texans about power, propaganda, and endurance. Augustus is one of fifty-eight treasures from the Torlonia Collection now on view at the Kimbell Art Museum in “Myth & Marble: Ancient Roman Sculpture from the Torlonia Collection,” a once-in-a-generation exhibition running Sept. 14 through Jan. 25, 2026.
“This collection is legendary,” said Eric M. Lee, the Kimbell’s director. “For decades it was locked away, unseen even by most scholars. The sculptures you’re about to see were made two thousand years ago, the same era as the Colosseum and the Pantheon, and yet they still carry an astonishing vitality.”
The Torlonia Collection’s story is nearly as dramatic as the empire it reflects. In the nineteenth century, Prince Giovanni Torlonia and his son Alessandro assembled what became known as a “collection of collections,” acquiring entire groups of Roman marbles through excavation and purchase. A private museum opened in 1876, but after World War II, it shuttered, and for nearly eighty years, the marbles were stored away. Only in recent years have they reemerged, dazzling audiences first in Rome, then in Paris, and now, improbably, in Fort Worth…