New York - Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Africa, Oceania & Americas Collection is housed in the Michael C. Rockefeller Wing, built by Nelson Rockefeller in 1982. The wing showcases more than 2,000 objects from Africa (ivory and bronze sculptures from Nigeria), the Pacific (carvings by the Asmat tribe of New Guinea), Latin America (pre-Columbian ceramics), and North America (Inuit art from the Arctic Circle).

The MET's American Art collection is housed in the American Wing and spans works from the fifteenth century to the present. Among the paintings are those by Edward Hopper, Frank Stella and Jackson Pollock, as well as Gilbert Stuart's first portrait of George Washington. Period rooms feature original woodwork and furnishings, such as the a living room designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1912.

Large-scale sculptures can be found in Engelhard Court, including the facade of an 1824 U.S. Branch Bank that stood on Wall Street.

The MET's Ancient Egyptian wing displays artifacts dating back to the prehistoric age. The wing's thousands of archeological finds include sculptures of Queen Hatshepsut and the massive Temple of Dendur.

The MET's collection of Ancient Near Eastern & Islamic Art spans 7,000 years. The entrance of this wing is guarded by human-headed winged lions from a ninth-century B.C. Assyrian Palace. Inside are Iranian bronzes, Anatolian ivories, Islamic art dating back to the seventh century, metalwork from ancient Egypt, Syria and Mesopotamia, Persian rugs, and an eighteenth-century room from Syria.

The MET's Armor collection is filled with suits of armor, rapiers, sabers (decorated with Precious stones and gold), sixteenth-century firearms, shields, heraldic banners and other artifacts that hearken back to the age of knights and chivalry.

The MET's collection of Asian art dates back to the second millennium BC and is drawn from countries as diverse as China, Japan, Korea, India and others. Highlights include Sung and Yuan paintings, Chinese Buddhist monumental sculptures, and Japanese ceramics. The collection is vast--Japanese art alone fills ten galleries.

The MET's collection of contemporary art is housed in the Lila Acheson Wallace wing. European painters such as Picasso and Kandinsky are represented, but the American component is stronger--O'Keefe, de Kooning, John Sloan, Warhol. Special areas showcase Art Nouveau and Art Deco furniture.

The MET's Costume Institute consists of 45,000 pieces dating back to the seventeenth-century to the present. Works by Elsa Schiaparelli, Worth, Quant and Balenciaga are highlights. Folk costumes from Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas are also housed here. More contemporary designs include David Bowie's sequined jockstrap.

The recent MET collection of drawings, prints & photographs is comprehensive. There are 4,000 drawings alone, including those by da Vinci, Goya, Seurat and Michelangelo. The print collection of 12,000 includes works by every major master printmaker in the world. The photography collection features treasures such as Steichen's "The Flatiron".

The heart of the MET is its European art collection which embraces sculpture and the decorative arts. Highlights include over a dozen Rembrandts, several Vermeers, Rubens and Van Dycks; 30 Monets, 17 Cezannes and Van Gogh's "Cypresses"; and Botticelli's "Last Communion". The Kravis Wing and adjacent galleries holds 60,000 pieces of sculpture and decorative arts including several by Degas and Rodin.

The MET's Greek and Roman galleries house everything from a roman sarcophagus, wall panels from Vesuvius in AD 79, and a seventh-century BC statue. These galleries date back to the opening of the MET.

The Lehman Collection belonged to investment banker, Robert Lehman before he gave it to the MET in 1971. Housed in a memorable glass pyramid, the eclectic collection gathers French paintings, Venetian glass, works by Dutch masters, Renaissance majorca and post-impressionist paintings.

The MET's Medieval art collection includes work dating back to the fourth century. Highlights include sculptures of the Virgin and Child, a 1301 pulpit by Giovanni Pisano, liturgical vessels, ivories, a chalice once considered to be the Holy Grail and tapestries from the fourteenth century.

The MET's musical instruments collection features the world's oldest piano, a Stradivarius violin (1691), Segovia's guitars, Asian lutes, and African drums.