Asian Art Galleries - China, Japan, Korea and the Islamic World
A stop on Washington DC National Mall Walking Tour, a free self-guided tour.
Around the courtyard, the Freer's galleries show Charles Lang Freer's Asian collection: ancient Chinese bronzes and jades, Chinese paintings and ceramics, Japanese screens and scrolls, Korean pottery and art from the Islamic world, including illustrated manuscripts.
One treasure is Waves at Matsushima, a pair of gold-leaf folding screens by the 17th-century Japanese painter Tawaraya Sotatsu, with rocks and pine-covered islands set in swirling waves. Like many fragile works here, it is shown only from time to time to protect it from light.
Because Freer's will forbids loans, nothing from the collection leaves the building, and the galleries rotate what they show. The exhibition A Museum in the Making, which opened in June 2026, looks at how Freer used his Detroit home to plan the collection and the museum.
Next, take the underground passage to the Sackler Gallery.
More on Wikipedia: Waves at Matsushima · Tawaraya Sotatsu · Charles Lang Freer
Stops on this tour
- Washington Monument
- National Museum of African American History and Cu
- National Museum of American History
- Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
- National Gallery of Art
- United States Capitol
- United States Botanic Garden
- National Museum of the American Indian
- National Air and Space Museum
- Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
- The Smithsonian Institution Building - The Castle
- Freer Gallery of Art
- Jefferson Memorial
- World War II Memorial
- Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial
- Korean War Memorial
- Lincoln Memorial
- Vietnam Veterans Memorial
- White House Ellipse
- White House
- Lafayette Square