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From celebratory statues to intricate mosaic panels, art was created for a wide variety of functions and contexts during the centuries that the Roman Empire reigned. Explore a few highlights from the Art Institute’s collection of ancient Roman art here.

Whether a painting, photograph, print, or sculpture—a portrait is often thought of as capturing a physical likeness of an individual.

The Art Institute was the first museum in the United States to assemble a significant collection of modern art and to put it on permanent display. Today these holdings are among the finest in the world—enjoy highlights from this pioneering collection.

Explore the ways LGBTQ+ artists have expressed gender, sexuality, and identity in the vast world of queer culture.

Communicating new perspectives, questioning the status quo, speaking out about beliefs, and inspiring others to take action—art and activism often share some of the same underlying motivations.

Have some of our most popular works resonated with you? Would you like to explore further? If so, our curators are happy to suggest some lesser known works they think you might like.

The Language of Beauty in African Art includes over 250 objects from the continent across millennia—but how have contemporary artists in particular responded to those objects and traditions?

The artist Camille Claudel devoted her short but remarkable career to sculpting the human figure.

New acquisitions strengthen, broaden, and deepen the stories we can share in our galleries. Here are a few of the past year’s most notable newcomers.

Chicago has long been a city that fosters and inspires artists, from students who are just starting their careers to acclaimed painters and sculptors. And the present day is no exception—the contemporary artists who call Chicago home make the city a vibrant community that welcomes creativity and big ideas. This tour, featuring a rotating selection of works created since 1990, showcases just a few of the many contemporary Chicago artists whose works are in the museum’s collection.

Every year we grow our collection with works that expand and deepen the stories we tell and the perspectives we share—across geographies, periods and cultures. Enjoy a few highlights of this past year’s additions.

Explore America now, through America then, in this audio tour inspired by the hit musical Hamilton.

Comprising works spanning five millennia and all of the continent’s major artistic traditions, the Art Institute’s collection of Asian art is especially wide-ranging. Enjoy a few highlights from this spectacular collection.

Between 1882 and 1890 Vincent van Gogh, Georges Seurat, Paul Signac, Emile Bernard, and Charles Angrand explored the landscape along the river Seine northwest of Paris.

The museum’s galleries are continually changing as newly acquired works and loaned objects join our spaces and expand the perspectives and stories that we share.

A constellation of exhibitions and events at the Art Institute and across the city that explore ideas around freedom, solidarity, and place from artists throughout Africa and the African diaspora.

The Art Institute acquired its first work by a black artist—Henry Ossawa Tanner’s The Two Disciples at the Tomb—in 1906, the same year it was made.

Asian, Asian American, and Pacific Islander American (A/AAPI) artists continue to push the contemporary art landscape across a variety of media—architecture, design, installation art, painting, photography, printmaking, sculpture, and textiles. 

The Obamas not only selected two groundbreaking contemporary artists, Kehinde Wiley and Amy Sherald, to paint their portraits, but as president and first lady, they also showcased an inclusive art collection while at the White House.