Universal Art
The Western European Painting Collection of the National Museum of Art of Moldova represents the Italian, Flemish, Dutch, French, German, Spanish, and other painting schools. The first works in the Western collection entered the museum in 1945, being transferred from the Rădăuți Museum as well as from central museums in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Since 1946, the museum's collection has been expanded through acquisitions and donations (including the donation by Pavel Șilingovschi in 1947). Currently, the NMAM holds a universal painting collection that includes 235 works from the 15th to the 20th centuries.
The earliest works are from the Italian Renaissance and Northern Renaissance periods, featuring biblical themes such as The Flight into Egypt, The Holy Family with John the Baptist, and Saint Catherine by Bernardino Luini, as well as Venus in Vulcan’s Forge by Jan Brueghel.
Biblical and mythological compositions, landscapes, portraits, and still life are the predominant genres. The paintings by French artists from the school of Watteau and Pierre Gobert, English artists George Morland and Godfrey Kneller, and Germans Balthasar Denner, Broderix, and Georg Philipp Rugendas clearly show the influence of 18th-century styles – Classicism and Rococo.
The 19th century, like earlier periods, is best represented in the museum's collection through the works of French and German artists who worked in the genres of landscape and portrait, being exponents of the styles of Sentimentalism, Realism, Biedermeier, and Romanticism.
Thus, the Western European Painting Collection of the National Museum of Art of Moldova offers the public the opportunity to explore the artistic world of the 15th to 20th centuries.
