According to the British Museum, the Orientalist art movement refers to "the representation of the East in Western art which often blurred the line between fantasy and reality." The movement took place during the 18th and 19th century, a time in which interactions between east and west slowly began to switch from just trade-oriented to that of an oppressed versus opressor relationship.
With the end of the colonial era in the 20th century many eastern philosophers and academics began deconstructing the movement of orientalism, questioning the motivations behind the western concept that depicted people from the east as 'exotic others' meant to be objectified by the west. One of these thinkers is Edward Said who laid the foundations for Orientalism as a nuanced academic study.
Through its definition in Edward Said's book, Orientalism is now understood to be an othering idea. Now, academics breakdown the concept of orientalism by questioning what it means to be labeled as the "orient" within the context of the 21st century riddled with the legacy of colonialism.
