Beyond the Arabian Nights. Orientalist Retellings

Containing some 300 masterpieces, this exhibition takes visitors on a voyage through the multiple lives of objects of the Orient, from the Middle Ages to the present day. From Paris to Isfahan, from the Alhambra to Cairo, and from Constantinople to Venice and Algiers, it presents a constellation of stories, where historical and imaginary accounts intermingle, to uncover and decipher the fascination for what was known as “the Orient”.

In the early 18th century, Antoine Galland from Picardy published the Arabian Nights in French. This collection of tales from Indian and Persian traditions, first compiled in Arabic in the 9th century, is recounted by the figure of Scheherazade, who tells a king stories that never end in order to escape certain death. They open the door to an imaginary world where the tale becomes a space for survival, invention and transmission, a world that would leave a profound mark on portrayals of the Orient. Shaped by centuries of retellings, these tales, and many others besides, helped cultivate a taste for the Orient, which inspired artists over the centuries, from Molière to Ingres and Delacroix to Matisse. They reveal a desire for new horizons and act as a mirror held up to European societies.

But the story did not begin with Galland, nor did it start in the 18th century. With its chronological and critical approach, the exhibition traces the cultural exchanges between the Orient and the Occident, through a French lens. From the Middle Ages, commercial, diplomatic and cultural exchanges caused objects, designs and knowledge to circulate across the shores of the Mediterranean and beyond. Textiles and precious objects were conserved in church treasuries and royal or princely collections, and were sometimes reused and transformed. Science, art and literature from the Islamic world were widely circulated, integrated and discussed. The Orient did not appear as a homogeneous or inert space, but as a multifaceted and shifting reality that was defined differently depending on the era and context.

The exhibition explores the fate of objects through a long-term perspective. Collected, admired, reinterpreted but sometimes poorly understood, they attest to the various uses they were put to, the moves they underwent and the varying attitudes that accompanied them. They come to life through their histories and movements, from church treasuries to French royal collections and from artist’s studios and collector’s interiors to museums of yesterday and today. These Orientalisms are expressed in all the arts – literary, theatrical, musical and film – telling stories of fascination and exchange, but also of stereotyping and incomprehension.

For the first time ever, a remarkable group of pieces from the Department of Islamic Arts at the Louvre Museum will be displayed at the Louvre-Lens. Among them are two exceptional masterpieces: the Baptistery of Saint Louis and the Lion of Monzon.
This unprecedented loan is complemented by artworks from French and Belgian collections.

The visit is divided into different sections: From the 8th century, objects originating from the Orient and considered precious circulated throughout Europe, enriching church treasuries and royal collections. The legend of the exchanges between Charlemagne and Harun al-Rashid illustrates the prestige of these objects. From the 13th and especially 16th century onwards, trade across the Mediterranean intensified the transfer of objects and skills, while diplomatic exchanges and a fascination with the Ottoman Empire fed Europe’s collective imagination and the fashion for Turqueries. The Orient inspired artists, authors and musicians from Molière
to Rameau, as did the translated and adapted Arabian Nights. Historical and imaginary accounts were created around iconic artworks such as the “Baptistery of Saint Louis”. In the 18th and 19th centuries, scholars travelled to the Alhambra and Cairo, revealing unfamiliar cultural heritages and inspiring Alhambra-ism in artistic creation, and 19th-century music in particular. From Ingres to Sophie Gabriac and Delacroix, and from Gérôme to Matisse, not to mention the collectors Goupil and Delort de Gléon, whose collections have been recreated here, idealised and collected objects were reinterpreted in painting and interior decorations.
The Paris Expositions popularised these often stereotyped images. Today, it is museums that are now examining these Orientalist retellings.

Throughout the chronological exhibition visit, contemporary counterpoints encourage further reflection: living artists – Abbas Akbari, Kader Attia, Dalila Dalléas Bouzar, Nezaket Ekici, Katia Kameli, Nicene Kossentini, Fatima Mazmouz, Sara Ouhaddou, Nazanin Pouyandeh, Zineb Sedira, Wael Shawky, Rayan Yasmineh, Nil Yalter and Amir Youssef – revisit these legacies and offer new readings that question the past and imagine a new present.

From past to present to future, the exhibition invites visitors to see the objects in a different light and hear their many and diverse voices. It reminds us that Orientalisms – imagined, debated and contested – also tell the story of Europe and its collective imagination. To return to the Arabian Nights and go “beyond” them is to recognise that Orientalisms are stories. Like any story, they have been and can be transmitted, rewritten, modified, questioned, expanded, criticised and retold. Like any story, they contain both light and dark elements. And like any story, the next stage in their history is still being written, as seen in works by contemporary artists.

Exhibition curators:
Gwenaëlle Fellinger, curator, Department of Islamic Arts, Louvre Museum
Souraya Noujaim, director, Department of Islamic Arts, Louvre Museum
Annabelle Ténèze, director of the Louvre-Lens
Assisted by Marie Gord, head of research at the Louvre-Lens

Scenography:
Philippine Ordinaire and Bertrand Houdin, artistic directors, with Mathis Boucher, architect-scenographer at the Louvre-Lens

With the support of the Fondation Crédit Mutuel Nord Europe, major sponsor.