Department of Prints and Drawings  

The Department of Prints and Drawings at the Kunsthalle Bremen is one of the most important collections of graphic works in Germany. Its holdings encompass over 220,000 works, including drawings, prints, watercolours, miniatures, sketch books, posters, and artistically illustrated books from seven centuries. A special focus of the collection is on drawings and prints of the German, Netherlandish, and Italian schools from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries, as well as on French and German art of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Works on paper are especially sensitive to light. For this reason, they are kept in closed portfolios, boxes, and cabinets and can only be presented in temporary exhibitions lasting three months. Academic catalogues and the Kunsthalle Bremen’s – future – online database will make selected works in the collection available on a permanent basis.

Works can be presented for viewing in the Old Cabinet, which was set up in 1902, on Tuesdays between 10 am and 4 pm or by appointment. Please contact our collection curators at +49 (0)421 - 32 908 460 or click on the contact form under "Ansprechpartner*innen" at the bottom of the page.

Upon prior arrangement, objects from the Department of Prints and Drawings can be made available in the Cabinet for teaching purposes. If you are an interested, please contact us beforehand to set a date.

The Kunsthalle Bremen realizes an extensive project to make the entire collection of the Department of Prints and Drawings accessible digitally. Works on paper will be entered into the Kunsthalle’s existing public online database and published successively. The long-term plan is to integrate the graphic collections of various national and international museums into a common portal to allow access to all the holdings in one place.

This project is supported by the Waldemar Koch Stiftung.

From 2017 till 2020, the extensive collection of fifteenth and sixteenth-century German and Netherlandish printed works and drawings from the Klugkist Collection were digitized, funded by the BMBF. The DFG project for digital coverage of French and Japanese prints and drawings has been running since May 2019.

Learn more about digital access to the Department of Prints and Drawings here.