V&A Museum to showcase rare ceiling from India

This frieze panel from the Kochi Ceiling will be featured in the new South Asia gallery at the Victoria and Albert Museum

The Victoria and Albert Museum will display a rare ceiling from India for the first time in more than 70 years.

The museum in Kensington will create a new South Asia gallery as part of the project, due to open in spring 2028.

The Kochi Ceiling is a painted and carved 19th-century wooden temple ceiling from south India.

The gallery will feature South Asian art divided across three time periods, from early and mediaeval to the present day.

About 50,000 artefacts

This panel from the Kochi ceiling, depicting Hindu deity Shiva, will go on display in 2028

About 50,000 objects, dating from 3,000BC to the present day, are within the collection.

It will explore South Asian artistic production and its influence around the world.

The rare ceiling, which was last on display in 1955, features fine sculpted panels that depict Hindu deities and stories from the Ramayana, the ancient Hindu epic.

Director of the V&A, Tristram Hunt, said: "The collection is one of the most significant of its kind in the Western world", adding that it "will help create a world-leading gallery of South Asian art and design and engage with a new generation of British, global and diasporic communities."

The project was partly funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.