The Universal Graphic Art Collection at the National Museum of Art of Moldova is the largest in the museum’s artistic heritage. It contains over 13,000 works from the 16th to the 20th centuries. This collection was largely formed between 1950 and 1990, as a result of works transferred from several museums in Moscow and St. Petersburg, followed by new acquisitions and donations from private individuals. The first works that formed the basis of the Universal Graphic Art Collection were those by artist Pavel Șilingovski, donated by the author through his will in 1947.
The collection includes works from various countries in Europe and Asia: France, Germany, Italy, Russia, England, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Belarus, Estonia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Japan, Mongolia, and China. The artists addressed all artistic genres in their works: portrait, landscape, still life, and genre scenes. The collection is also characterized by a vast diversity of techniques and materials used. Among the most common techniques are woodcut, aquaforte, lithography, engraving with a burin, mezzotint, punch engraving, linocut, and others.
The creators of these works include Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528), Harmensz van Rijn Rembrandt (1606-1669), Auguste Renoir (1841-1919), Paul Gavarni (1804-1866), Adolph Menzel (1815-1905), followed by Kilian Bartolomeo the Elder (17th century), Johann Müller (1759-1805), Auguste Lemaitre (1797-18..), Marie Alexandre Alophe (1813-1863), Ivan Shishkin (1832-1898), Piotr Boreli (1829-1898), Vladimir Favorski (1886-1964), Antonio Tempesta (1555-1630), Francišek Smiglewici (1745-1807), Carl Harman Pfeifer (1769-1829), and others.
A special place in the museum’s artistic heritage is occupied by Japanese engraving. Over 300 works dating from the 17th to the 20th centuries were created by artists who later became internationally recognized as prominent figures in art history, including Ando Kwagetsudo (1671-1743), Kiyonaga Torii (1752-1815), Kitagawa Utamaro (1753-1806), Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849), Utagawa Kunisada (1786-1864), Ando Hiroshige (1797-1850), Taiso Eshitoshi (1839-1892), and Toyohara Kunichika (1835-1900), among others.
Japanese woodblock printing, as a major artistic genre, emerged in the 17th century. Ishikawa Moronobu (1625-1694) is credited with introducing the first "independent" woodcut prints, produced in series and printed in black and white, alongside book illustrations. He was the first artist to open his own workshop and teach apprentices. Woodcutting was done manually by three people. Later, in 1765, Suzuki Harunobu, by layering 7-8-10 colors, became the father of polychrome printing. Thus, the ukiyo-e movement was born – "the floating world image." The most distinctive achievements of this movement are the engravings. In the city of Edo (today's Tokyo), there was a district of major publishers of popular books who, in the mid-17th century, conceived the idea of using woodcut techniques to multiply paintings and distribute them at an affordable price. The preferred themes were everyday life: festivities, holidays, scenes from the courtesans' houses, portraits of beautiful women (bijin-ga), portraits of kabuki theater actors (yakusha-e), and landscapes. The representatives of the ukiyo-e movement gave expressiveness and grace to Japanese woodblock printing, creating an authentic, vivid, and fascinating image of the Edo period.
