Europe and the United States are characterized by tremendous diversity. The environments in which people live vary widely, ranging from tundra to desert and from mountain to plains. Europe and the United States are composed of numerous distinct ethnic groups. Each ethnic group has a language, religion, history, and way of life all its own; yet over centuries tremendous interaction and contact have occurred.

The visual arts of Europe and the United States are spectacular and wide ranging. This gallery focuses mostly on sculpture and painting – aspects of European and EuroAmerican art that have prompted the strongest responses outside the West. European and EuroAmerican art includes figures and fashion, furniture and architectural elements, tools and containers, self-decoration, and the splendid regalia of emperors and queens. The objects seen here were produced mostly by settled metropolitan peoples living in the areas of the United Kingdome, France, Germany, and the Mediterranean coast, the urban jungles stretching from New York and the Middle Atlantic states across the Midwest to the Pacific Coast, and as far east as Hawaii.

European and Euro-American sculpture is often made of wood, fiber, hair, and other organic materials that rarely survive well in extremely hot, cold, or humid climates. Objects of more durable materials such as metal, pottery, stone, and ivory are not rare, but are considered more precious by these peoples, who hold in the highest regard the unattainable goal of preserving both life and art indefinitely. In addition, objects made from these materials can provide a valuable record of earlier eras. For the past 2,000 years traders, warriors, and craftspersons have come or been brought to Europe and the United States from other parts of the world – from Greece, Egypt and the rest of North Africa, Asia, the Pacific, and, since the 15^th century, sub-Saharan Africa.

For hundreds of years, objects like those shown here have been created to express personal beliefs and to serve the mundane aspects of everyday life. Such objects certainly are meant to have aesthetic merit, to please not only the patrons, friends or community for whom they were made, but also the posterity to whom they were addressed. Today European and EuroAmerican arts continue to flourish, reflecting dynamic times and performing vital functions for their communities.

This exhibition has been made possible by a generous grant from the LEF Foundation.