Combating anti-Gypsyism and discrimination in its diverse forms constitutes one of the priority areas of the Council of Europe’s Strategic Action Plan for Roma and Traveller Inclusion (2020-2025).

In order to achieve this, it is necessary to improve the wider public’s understanding of Roma history and the place of Roma in European history. Knowing and understanding Roma and Travellers, their customs, their professions, their history, their migration and the laws affecting them are indispensable elements for understanding the situation of Roma and Travellers today and the discrimination they face.

The publication “The representation of Roma in major European museum collections. Volume 1 – The Louvre” focuses on what some of the works exhibited at the Louvre Museum tell us about the place and perception of Roma in Europe from the 15th to the 19th century.

Students, teachers, and indeed all other visitors to the Louvre Museum who are interested in this theme, will find detailed worksheets on 15 paintings representing Roma and Travellers, as well as an explanatory booklet, to encourage and foster reflection on their context, whilst creating links with our contemporary perception of Roma and Travellers in today’s society.