In its first exhibition in the continental United States, the artist Lisa Reihana’s extraordinary 70-foot-long video, in Pursuit of Venus [infected]—recently acquired by the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco—is presented with the French Neoclassical wallpaper (from ca. 1804–1806) on which it is based. The experiential video reimagining allows visitors to reflect upon notions about Pacific culture and history that originated with the European voyages of exploration in the eighteenth-century Age of Enlightenment and persist even today. Below, curators from the European Art department provide more historical context on the wallpaper, Les Sauvages de la Mer Pacifique, which inspired Reihana’s vast work.
![Installation view of "Les Sauvages de la Mer Pacifique" in "Lisa Reihana: in Pursuit of Venus [infected]" at the de Young museum](https://deyoung.famsf.org/sites/default/files/styles/article_image_1094/public/articles/images/2019_dey_lisareihana_v16.jpg?itok=Wjrp-6W1)