The Prints and Drawings Room is a department that boasts the largest collection of the National Museum in Krakow, comprising 160,000 objects. Established in 1883, it constitutes one of the most important museum collections of this type in Poland. The room consists of the following sections:

• prints,
• drawings and watercolours,
• design,
• miniatures,
• posters,
• blocks and plates,
• photomontages.

The most numerous section – prints – was divided into the following groups: early Polish printmaking, early foreign printmaking, Polish printmaking of the 20th/21st century, foreign printmaking of the 20th/21st century, early Polish and foreign applied printmaking, Polish and foreign applied printmaking of the 20th/21st century, portraits, views, saints, bookplates, militaria, illustrative woodcut, costume, as well as Polish and foreign albums.

The collection of the Room consists of paper-based works created by Polish and foreign artists between the 16th century and the present day. Other well-represented groups contain prints, iconography collections and applied printmaking. Our distinguished benefactors include Feliks Jasieński, Emeryk Hutten-Czapski, Ludwik Skarbek Michałowski, Władysław Bartynowski, Stanisław Ursyn Rusiecki and Leon Kostka.

The collection of prints is representative of the history of Polish printmaking. The National Museum in Krakow is in possession of a nearly complete oeuvre of Jean-Pierre Norblin, Jeremias Falck, Stefano della Bella, Kajetan Wincent Kielisiński as well as significant collections of prints by Aleksander Orłowski, Fryderyk Krzysztof Dietrich, Jan Zachariasz Frey, Antoni Oleszczyński and Jan Feliks Piwarski. Noteworthy early foreign prints include works by Jacques Callot, Daniel Chodowiecki and a set of print series by Francisco Goya.

Printmaking of the 20th and the 21st century is superbly represented by the Polish artists (e.g. Leon Wyczółkowski, Józef Pankiewicz) and valuable French prints by Pierre Bonnard, Eugène Carrière, Maurice Denis, Paul Gauguin, Odilon Redon, Auguste Reonoire and Henri de Tolouse-Lautrec.

The iconography collection features a valuable set of portraits of the royalty and prominent historical figures. Another noteworthy group features an impressive set of Views including vedute of most cities in Poland and the former Commonwealth, as well as main European cities.

The Drawings section predominantly consists of works by Polish artists of the 19th and 20th century, made in various drawing techniques as well as pastels and watercolours. Some of the noteworthy works were authored by Jean Pierre Norblin, Piotr Michałowski, Artur Grottger, Juliusz Kossak, Henryk Siemiradzki, Stanisław Wyspiański, Leon Wyczółkowski, Józef Mehoffer, Olga Boznańska, Józef Pankiewicz, Jan Stanisławski, Jacek Malczewski, Teodor Axentowicz, and Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz.