Graphic collections lead a “shadow existence”, for conservational reasons. Stored in metal or wooden cabinets, dust-tight and climate-controlled, prints are considered sensitive cultural artefacts that require special protection. The Magdeburg collection comprises nearly 40,000 drawings and prints from the 15th to 20th century. It is organised chronologically and alphabetically, according to the type of print or drawing.
The collection of late 15th- to 18th-century prints includes works by leading artists from Germany, Italy, France and the Netherlands, such as Albrecht Dürer, Lucas van Leyden, Bartel Behaim, Andrea Mantegna, Giovanni Piranesi, Rembrandt van Rijn, Claude Lorrain and Daniel Chodowietzki. Particularly noteworthy are the vedute of the city of Magdeburg from the 16th to 20th century, including a special view painted by Jan van de Velde. You can find a selection of the cityscapes here.
In addition to 19th-century prints by artists such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Honoré Daumier, Max Klinger and Wilhelm Leibl, the collection also includes a particularly impressive selection of early 20th-century prints, mainly by German expressionists. Prints by Max Beckmann, Otto Dix, Emil Nolde and Max Pechstein, for example, as well as those by their colleagues Ernst Barlach, Lovis Corinth and Käthe Kollwitz, are among the highlights of the collection.
Of particular importance are the drawings from the late 18th and 19th century, which include works by Carl Blechen, Friedrich Overbeck, Ludwig Richter, Moritz von Schwind and Friedrich Wasmann. A catalogue of the collection was published in 2016, presenting and classifying the works. In recent years, numerous German commercial art prints from the 19th century have been catalogued, in particular the Napoleon caricatures and several illustrated broadsheets.
From the 1970s onwards, the acquisitions continued to focus on prints and drawings by members and graduates of the Magdeburg School of Art and Design, as well as on GDR artists.
You can find selected objects at Museum-Digital.
