The Met Just Dropped Its John Galliano Exhibition After Weeks of Backlash — Here’s What Happened

The Met has dropped its planned John Galliano exhibition for 2027 after backlash over the designer’s past remarks. Here’s what happened and what it means for the next Met Gala.

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Muhammad Ali Akbar

8/31/2026

John Galliano's design in Moscow
John Galliano's design in Moscow

On July 31, the Metropolitan Museum of Art announced John Galliano: Horizons, a major Costume Institute retrospective covering Galliano’s career from his 1984 Central Saint Martins collection through Givenchy, Christian Dior and Maison Margiela. It would have made Galliano only the third living designer to receive a solo Costume Institute exhibition.

Exactly one month later, the project was gone.

On August 31, The Met and Galliano announced that the exhibition would “not proceed as planned.” The museum said information about a new spring 2027 Costume Institute exhibition—and the next Met Gala—will come later.

Why the backlash became so intense

The controversy was never primarily about Galliano’s influence on fashion. It centered on whether one of fashion’s highest institutional honors was appropriate given his past conduct.

Galliano was dismissed from Dior in 2011 after antisemitic and racist remarks became public. A Paris court subsequently convicted him over public insults based on race, religion, ethnicity or origin. The Met’s original exhibition announcement acknowledged this history and said the show intended to examine his creative achievements alongside questions of ethical accountability.

Criticism nevertheless grew among Jewish leaders, donors and New York officials. The timing created another problem: May 3, 2027—the traditional first Monday in May—falls on Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day. Reports said that coincidence intensified objections to centering the gala around Galliano.

Galliano said in his withdrawal statement that he remained accountable for the pain caused by his past words and expressed particular regret for harm caused to Jewish and Asian communities.

What happens to the 2027 Met Gala now?

This distinction matters: the 2027 Met Gala has not been canceled.

What has been scrapped is the Galliano retrospective that was supposed to provide the Costume Institute’s spring exhibition—and therefore the creative framework around which the gala would be built.

John Galliano-era Christian Dior designs at the 2011 Dior exhibition in Moscow — Photo by Shakko, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0. Cropped to 16:9.