The National Museum in Warsaw has been through quite a lot lately: new exhibitions, new graphic design, new website, new cafe. The changes made are visible: one of the recent exhibitions called “The Elevated. From pharaohs to Lady GaGa” was an absolute hit and the exhibits astounded even the greatest admirers of art.
There are many sculptures and reliefs, some of them from the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, works of Lucas Cranach the Older, busts of the famous and infamous. From modern times: photos by Poremba or a giant work by Nicholas Robespierre, a French photographer based in Warsaw. My personal favorite was a red and white chess set, a rare and extremely precisely carved rarity, and portraits of one of the Sejm members at the beginning of the 20th Century.
The National Museum also has an art/book shop – an endless source of engaging books, interesting t-shirts, postcards and gadgets.
Until 23 August there is an exhibition of 19th-century Polish painting, presenting works by the greatest Polish artists: Stanisław Wyspiański, Aleksander and Maksymilian Gierymski, Jan Matejko, Leon Wyczółkowski, Józef Mehoffer, Olga Boznańska, Józef Brandt, Józef Chełmoński, Ferdynand Ruszczyc, Konrad Krzyżanowski, Jacek Malczewski, Wojciech Weiss, Jan Stanisławski, Juliusz and Wojciech Kossak, Witold Wojtkiewicz, Władysław Ślewiński, Artur Grottger, Józef Simmler, Julian Fałat, Zbigniew Pronaszko and other artists.
