American Native​,​ Oceanic​,​ African Art

The collections of African, Native American, and Oceanic art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art are housed in the Michael C. Rockefeller Wing, one of the Met's most historically significant additions. During the 1950s and 1960s, statesman and philanthropist Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller assembled a survey of non-Western art traditions covering the ancient Americas, Africa, and Oceania, and in 1969 his collection was transferred to the Met as a new department and wing. The wing opened to the public in 1982, named after Nelson Rockefeller's son Michael C. Rockefeller, who had been deeply drawn to Pacific art and culture, particularly the Asmat sculptures he collected and studied in southwest New Guinea. Since that founding gift, the Met's holdings in this area have tripled through further gifts and acquisitions, coming to include works by indigenous artists from roughly 234 distinct cultures across the ancient Americas and more than 2,800 Oceanic works, including over 600 Asmat pieces Michael Rockefeller gathered during two 1961 expeditions. The wing underwent a major, multiyear transformation that reshaped how these collections are presented. The renovation lasted four years, and the Met reopened the Rockefeller Wing on May 31, 2025, with over 1,800 works spanning five continents and hundreds of cultures, now displayed in three distinct spaces rather than grouped together. The African, Ancient Americas, and Oceania galleries are presented as independent entities but remain connected, with design elements referencing the vernacular architecture of each region. The redesign, led by architect Kulapat Yantrasast of the firm wHY, also emphasized natural light and visual connections to Central Park. New additions include major new acquisitions of historical and contemporary African art, a gallery dedicated to light-sensitive ancient Andean textiles (the first of its kind in the U.S.), and new commissions by Indigenous artists for the Oceania galleries, reflecting the Met's effort to deepen and update the scholarly context around these long-celebrated collections.