The Met Gala 2026 theme is all about ‘embracing the body’
The 2026 Met Gala is putting bodies back into fashion.
On Monday, the Metropolitan Museum of Art revealed the theme for its spring exhibition and star-studded fundraiser: “Costume Art,” set to examine “the centrality of the dressed body.”
The show will pair approximately 200 garments and accessories with 200 artworks spanning from Western prehistory to the present day to explore how fashion and flesh have shaped one another throughout the ages.
“Rather than prioritizing fashion’s visuality, which often comes at the expense of the corporeal, ‘Costume Art’ privileges its materiality and the indivisible connection between our bodies and the clothes we wear,” Bolton said in the release.
One example: a 1504 Albrecht Dürer print depicting Adam and Eve displayed next to Walter Van Beirendonck’s 2009 spandex bodysuits inspired by the prelapsarian pair.
The works will be organized into thematic body types that reflect their “ubiquity and endurance through time and space,” according to the release. These include categories like “the Naked Body,” “the Classical Body,” “the Pregnant Body” and “the Mortal Body.”
In its announcement detailing the theme, Vogue included a glimpse of several of the garments set to be featured, including Georgina Godley’s rounded “Pregnancy” dress and a 2017 Comme des Garçons look with exaggerated, sculptural curves.
The exhibition opens May 10 and runs through Jan. 10, 2027, inaugurating the museum’s new 12,000-square-foot Condé M. Nast Galleries.
The Met Gala, which funds the majority of the Costume Institute’s operations, will be held on May 4.
Jeff Bezos, 61, and wife Lauren Sánchez, 55, are serving as lead sponsors after skipping this year’s “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style” gala to plan their lavish June wedding in Venice. The couple made their Met debut in 2024, with Sánchez dressed in Oscar de la Renta.
“Superfine” is the museum’s first exhibition specifically focused on Black American style and the first to highlight menswear since 2003. The gala, co-chaired by Colman Domingo, Lewis Hamilton, A$AP Rocky, Pharrell Williams and Anna Wintour, raised a record $31 million for the Costume Institute.
Celebrity co-chairs for the 2026 gala will be announced in the coming months.
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