Kupferstich-Kabinett, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden

Located in Dresden’s Royal Castle, the Kupferstich-Kabinett (literally translated as ‘engraving-cabinet’) is one of Europe’s oldest museums devoted to works on paper. Founded in 1720 by Friedrich August I, Elector of Saxony, it developed from the Dresden court collections into a museum that today preserves more than 500,000 prints, drawings, photographs, and other works on paper.

Dutch and Flemish prints and drawings are among the museum’s oldest holdings. The most significant acquisition was the purchase in 1728 of the prestigious collection of the Leipzig alderman Gottfried Wagner, which comprised more than 10,000 drawings. Other major works entered through the collection of the Dresden court artist Christian Wilhelm Ernst Dietrich. Among them was probably one of the greatest treasures of the Dresden collection: Jan van Eyck’s silverpoint drawing Portrait of an Old Man, the earliest surviving portrait drawing from life securely attributed to a named artist in Northern Europe.

The collection contains works by Pieter Bruegel, Hendrick Goltzius, Jacques de Gheyn II, and Peter Paul Rubens, as well as lesser-known artists and sheets of uncertain attribution. Together they provide a comprehensive overview of the diversity of artistic styles, subjects, and techniques across different regions and historical periods in the Low Countries. Particular strengths include around twenty original drawings by Rembrandt and an extensive collection of his etchings and drypoints, many preserved in multiple states and impressions.

The museum also houses a comprehensive collection of Dutch and Flemish prints, many of which remain in original albums, providing a rare glimpse into eighteenth-century collecting practices.

The collection suffered significant losses at the end of the Second World War: since 1945, around 220 drawings and numerous prints by Dutch and Flemish artists, including works attributed to Rembrandt and Rubens, have remained missing (listed in Dittrich 1987).

Dr. Stephanie Buck, Director Kupferstich-Kabinett and Curator for Netherlandish Prints and Drawings before 1800, Dr. Ksenija Tschetschik-Hammerl, Assistant Curator (July 2026)