An art gallery is a room or a building in which visual art is displayed. In Western cultures from the mid-15th century, a gallery was any long, narrow covered passage along a wall, first used in the sense of a place for art in the 1590s. The long gallery in Elizabethan and Jacobean houses served many purposes including the display of art. Historically, art is displayed as evidence of status and wealth, and for religious art as objects of ritual or the depiction of narratives. The first galleries were in the palaces of the aristocracy, or in churches. As art collections grew, buildings became dedicated to art, becoming the first art museums.

The art world comprises everyone involved in producing, commissioning, presenting, preserving, promoting, chronicling, criticizing, buying and selling fine art. It is recognized that there are many art worlds, defined either by location or alternative definitions of fine art. Some may use the singular art world to refer only to the elite level of globalized fine art. The art world(s) are continually changing in response both to the creativity of those that create art and in response to social change.