Met Gala 2026 theme announced: “Costume Art” celebrates fashion as fine art

The Met Gala has officially announced its 2026 theme: “Costume Art.” Following 2025’s groundbreaking tribute to Black fashion culture, a theme that reshaped conversations around heritage, influence and creativity on the global stage, the Museum is now turning its gaze to the dressed body itself. And with that, the Met Gala steps into one of its most ambitious artistic eras yet.

Opening on May 10, 2026, “Costume Art” is The Costume Institute’s annual spring exhibition, debuting inside a brand-new, nearly 12,000-square-foot suite of galleries adjacent to the Great Hall. This exhibition explores fashion as fine art by tracing how clothing and the human form have been depicted throughout Western art history, from prehistory to today. By pairing garments with artworks from across the Museum’s vast collection, “Costume Art” highlights the profound, often unspoken relationship between dress and the body.

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Andrew Bolton, Curator in Charge of The Costume Institute, describes the exhibition as a moment of recognition. “What connects every curatorial department and what connects every single gallery in the museum is fashion, or the dressed body,” he tells Vogue. “It’s the common thread throughout the whole museum… Even the nude is never naked. It’s always inscribed with cultural values and ideas.”

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Bolton has arranged the exhibition around a series of thematic body types grouped into three categories. Some examine bodies that dominate art history, the classical body, the draped body, the nude. Others centre bodies that have been overlooked, including the pregnant body, the aging body and non-idealised forms. A final set explores universal themes, like the anatomical body. The result is a sweeping, inclusive view of corporeality that stands in stark contrast to the narrow ideals often promoted within fashion.

His intention is clear: “The idea was to put the body back into discussions about art and fashion, and to embrace the body, not take it away as a way of elevating fashion to an art form.”

“Costume Art” also marks a new chapter for The Met: it is the inaugural exhibition in the museum’s newly dedicated gallery suite, which will house future Costume Institute spring shows and cement fashion’s place at the heart of the institution.

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On Monday, May 4, 2026, the Met Gala fundraiser will celebrate the exhibition’s grand opening. Expect a red carpet that transforms into a living gallery, a parade of sculptural silhouettes, conceptual couture and interpretations of the human form as art itself.

Each year, fashion lovers say, “This look belongs in a museum.” In 2026, that sentiment becomes the theme. With “Costume Art,” the Met Gala isn’t just showcasing fashion, it’s redefining it as the museum’s most intimate, enduring masterpiece.