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The Art collection at the National Museum Cardiff houses 28,000 works on paper. These comprise watercolours, drawings, prints, sketchbooks and albums. It is a broad-based collection, ranging from prints by Rembrandt and Picasso to watercolours by Cézanne and Turner and drawings by Burne-Jones and David Nash. There are particularly extensive holdings of works by Augustus and Gwen John (over 2,000 works), Graham Sutherland, David Jones and Ray Howard-Jones. These give a unique insight into the working methods of these artists. We also have a large collection of topographical views of Wales.
Works on paper are very sensitive to their environment – exposure to light causes colours to fade and paper to become brittle. These works are also too numerous and too vulnerable to be on permanent display. They are stored in the climate-controlled Prints and Drawings Study Room. Previous temporary exhibitions of works on paper from the collection have included Unseen Gwen John, Victorian Visions, A Picturesque Tour of Wales and Sisters Select: Works on paper from the Davies collection.
