Orientalism: Between Fact and Fantasy

European paintings and decorative arts depicting the Orient, examining Orientalist aesthetics.

Why go

The Met's first exhibition to make Orientalism its central focus, spanning 180 objects across 12 departments—paintings, drawings, photographs, textiles, ceramics, and metalwork—tracing how Islamic visual language transformed European and American design and artistic practice.

What to expect

Four interconnected galleries displaying easel paintings alongside drawings, illustrated books, arms and armor, glassware, and decorative arts, with works by Ingres, Delacroix, and Gérôme alongside Islamic objects and Ottoman artists, inviting multiple entry points through the collection.

Things to know

• First Met exhibition to explore Orientalism as its central focus.
• Approximately 180 objects from 12 Met departments plus rarely seen loans from the U.S. and abroad.
• Spans from Napoleon's 1798 conquest of Egypt through Ottoman renaissance artist Osman Hamdi Bey.
• Displayed across four galleries straddling European Paintings and Islamic Art departments.
• Features works by Jean-Léon Gérôme, Eugène Delacroix, and Jean-Auguste Dominique Ingres.
• Owen Jones and other influential figures used Islamic art to transform European and American architecture and design.

Plan your visit

Free with Museum admission. On view through February 28, 2027, at The Met Fifth Avenue across Galleries 454, 458, and 803–804.