Welcome to the Henriette Polak Museum, the museum for modern-classical painting and sculpture in the Netherlands. Since its opening in 1975, the Henriette Polak Museum has displayed the vitality, power, and diversity of figurative art, where craftsmanship and passion meet.
At the end of the 1960s, the founders of this museum set out with a mission: to save artworks ‘of which the importance is not enough appreciated, due to temporarily prevailing tendencies’. They wanted to safeguard the position of modern-classical art. In the 1950s and 1960s, everyone was focused on innovation, experimentation, and abstraction – at the expense of traditional, figurative art. Several artists continue to work in the classical-modern tradition, and became involved in founding the museum. Their work forms the basis of the collection.
During your visit, you’ll get to know the art patron Henriette Polak and the core collection of the museum. Feast your eyes on masterpieces by artists like Kees Verwey, Charlotte van Pallandt, Wim Oepts, Arie Schippers and Wendelien Schönfeld, come face to face with the many artist portraits for which the museum is famous, and take a look in the atelier. In the Digital Depot, you will discover a representative selection from the vast museum collection. From this selection, you will be able to create your own exhibition and display your selected works on the walls of the museum.
