Hometown Tourist #2: Rome Exhibition and Street Art

April 29, 2026

I love all things ancient, and since I have just finished presenting on Revelation at church which involved a fair bit of talk about the Roman context, I was keen to see the Rome: Empire, Power, People exhibition at the Melbourne Museum. I chose to do the guided tour which started at 8:45 am. I caught public transport in, which is free at the moment.

The exhibition contained pieces from the Museo Nazionale Romano and the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Firenze. It was a really well designed exhibition with the pieces arranged to showcase various aspects of life in the Roman Imperial era. The guide was good, selecting pieces in each gallery to talk about as she explained what they told us about daily life.

The gallery devoted to objects of worship

A fresco featuring objects from the theater

Roman sarcophagus with the deceased flanked by Victoria and over scenes depicting captured slaves

The tour ticket allowed unlimited entrance to the museum all day. I doubled back to have a closer look at some of the pieces in the Rome exhibition after the tour finished, then I headed to the Bunjilaka Cultural Center on the ground floor of the museum. I’ve visited this before but they do change things up so I thought I’d go for a refresher. I skipped the rest of the museum and headed out into the beautiful warm, sunshine of this late Autumn day.

I wandered down into the city and checked out some street art before popping into the Hill of Content for a browse, then to a Melbourne Institution—Pellegrinis, for lunch. The cafe was established in 1954 and was one of the first in Melbourne with an Italian espresso machine. I remember stopping in the back area with my parents on our way home from beach holidays and picking salads from the display. After that area closed dad would occasionally take one or more of us kids with him and we’d sit in the kitchen and have a plate of lasagna. Dad also picked up a big tray of lasagna for some of our family celebrations. Now I sit at the marble bar on a red vinyl stool like with all the other adults. Just after I arrived an American came in and sat next to me. He was visiting from Atlanta for business and had asked ChatGPT for an iconic Melbourne lunch spot.