Stereotyped Western impressions of Arabs and the Islamic world became increasingly popular in the West in the nineteenth century. This wave of Orientalism found expression in high art, as in the renowned painting Women of Algiers in Their Apartment (1834), by French painter Eugène Delacroix (below). Delacroix portrays three women and their African servant at rest in a harem, the segregated, women-only living quarters for the wives of elite Muslim men (Islamic law allows a man to have several wives). Orientalist ideas also made their way into the fabric of everyday life, when ordinary people visited museum exhibits, read newspaper articles, or purchased popular colonial products like cigarettes, coffee, and chocolate. This “Official Guide” (right) to an exhibition on Cairo held in Berlin offers an exotic look at foreign lands. Note the veiled women in the center and the pyramid and desert mosque in the background.

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