Celebrating The Met: Highlights from the Gift of The Metropolitan Museum of Art to the Muzeul Textilelor

25 September 2026 – 31 January 2027

This exhibition is presented as part of the project “Muzeul Textilelor – Everything Is Connected”

The exhibition presents a selection of garments and textile objects from the gift made by The Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met), New York, to the Muzeul Textilelor in Băița, Hunedoara County.

The connection between the two institutions is also rooted in a professional relationship built over several decades. Dr Florica Zaharia, founder of Muzeul Textilelor and Conservator Emerita at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, spent twenty-eight years in The Met’s Department of Textile Conservation, which she headed for thirteen years. His experience in researching and preserving textile heritage contributes to the perspective from which the pieces on display in the exhibition are viewed and connected.

The selection on view at the National Museum of Art of Romania brings together objects originating from different geographical and cultural contexts, highlighting both, the distinctive features of individual traditions and the connections between materials, techniques, forms and the ways in which textiles are used.

Romanian textile heritage occupies an important place within this perspective and is presented in dialogue with objects from other cultures. Their juxtaposition reveals similarities and differences that extend beyond geographical boundaries: the ways in which local resources influence the choice of materials, how techniques are adapted and transmitted, and how function, aesthetic expression and cultural identity converge within a textile object.

The exhibition thus invites us to consider textiles not only as heritage objects, but also as bearers of knowledge. Fibers, structures, techniques, colors and ornaments speak of the communities that created them, their relationship with the environment and the resources available to them, and of the practices transmitted across generations.

As part of the project “Muzeul Textilelor – Everything Is Connected”, the exhibition foregrounds the place of Romanian textile heritage within an international context, as well as the role of research in understanding and preserving it. The gift from The MET to Muzeul Textilelor thus becomes the starting point for a dialogue between collections, cultures and textile traditions, as well as for reflection on the ways in which heritage continues to create connections in the present.

Venue:

National Museum of Art of Romania

3rd Floor, Gallery of Oriental Art – Central Hall

Visiting hours:

Wednesday–Friday: 10:00–18:00

Saturday–Sunday: 11:00–19:00

Museography and research: Dr Florica Zaharia

Curator: Teodor Frolu

Organisers: Muzeul Textilelor, National Museum of Art of Romania, DC Communication

Project co-funded by the Administration of the National Cultural Fund (AFCN).