Best Asian Art Museums in Europe
What follows is a personal but defensible shortlist — the ten institutions any serious traveller in this field should know, with a note on what makes each one distinctive.
Musée Guimet, Paris
The Guimet on Place d'Iéna holds Europe's largest Asian art collection — Khmer sculpture from Angkor, Indian Buddhist art, Chinese ceramics, and Japanese painting. The Pelliot Dunhuang material is particularly important.
British Museum Asian galleries, London
The British Museum's dedicated Joseph E. Hotung Gallery for Chinese and South Asian art, plus the Japanese gallery, together form one of Europe's most comprehensive Asian survey collections.
Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin
In the new Humboldt Forum since 2021, Berlin's Asian art collections include major Turfan material from Albert Grünwedel's Silk Road expeditions.
Museum für Ostasiatische Kunst, Cologne
Germany's oldest specifically East Asian art museum (1913), now in the Kazuo Shinohara-completed building on the Aachener Weiher.
Victoria and Albert Museum, London
The V&A's Asian galleries are particularly strong on South and Southeast Asia — Tipu's Tiger, the Mughal jewellery collection, and the temple sculpture in the Nehru Gallery.
Rietberg Museum, Zurich
In the former Wesendonck villa, the Rietberg holds an exceptional collection of non-European art with particular strength in Japanese woodblock prints and Indian sculpture.
Chester Beatty Library, Dublin
Alfred Chester Beatty's bequest to Ireland includes major holdings of Islamic, Chinese, Japanese, and Tibetan manuscripts — the world's most comprehensive collection of Mughal albums outside India.
National Museum of Asian Art, Stockholm (Östasiatiska)
Sweden's museum of East Asian art holds the Andersson collection of Chinese neolithic ceramics and major Japanese woodblock prints.
Museo d'Arte Orientale, Turin (MAO)
Italy's leading Asian art museum in the Palazzo Mazzonis covers South, East, and Southeast Asia and the Islamic world.
Rietveld Pavilion / Wereldmuseum, Netherlands
The merged Dutch national ethnographic and Asian collections in Leiden, Amsterdam, and Rotterdam form a major reference for Indonesian colonial-era material — with active repatriation discussions ongoing.
Any thematic shortlist will leave out worthy candidates; treat the above as a starting point for further exploration rather than a closed canon.
Keep exploring
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