On loan to The Met The Met accepts temporary loans of art both for short-term exhibitions and for long-term display in its galleries.
Promenade et tours d’enceinte du palais de l’Alhambra à Grenade (Towers surrounding the Alhambra Palace, Granada)
Joseph-Philibert Girault de Prangey French
Not on view
"Such is the Alhambra—a Moslem pile in the midst of a Christian land, an Oriental palace amidst the Gothic edifices of the West, an elegant memento of a brave, intelligent, and graceful people who conquered, ruled and passed away." American writer Washington Irving’s wistful 1832 line could serve as a caption to Girault’s romanticized painting, exhibited at the Paris Salon in 1836, which similarly presumes Western cultural dominance. Girault prized the Alhambra as the pinnacle of Andalusian architecture and published the finest measured drawings and plans of the palace produced up to that time.