National Museum Tours and Activities

The biggest museum in all of Krakow, the National Museum, is actually the regional (and most important) branch of Poland’s National Museum - There are over 21 departments in Krakow alone, made up of 12 conservation workshops, 2 libraries and 11 galleries, each divided by art period, for a grand total of over 780,000 artworks. The museum came to be after Henryk Siemiradzki, one of Poland’s most celebrated painters, offered one of his works to the city of Krakow; soon after, hundreds of other artists and collectors started doing the same – forcing the city to adopt a special motion to house this invaluable collection. By creating the museum, the Polish government wanted to promote the achievements of the Krakow artistic community and the fine arts in general to the people of Poland, and, later on, to visitors from around the world.