Opening hours: Closed Mondays and days following public holidays; Tuesdays-Fridays, 10am-6pm; Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays, noon-4pm.
Since it was created in 1880, the museum has principally collected artefacts from the Bydgoszcz and environs including items from archaeological excavations, city documents, artistic crafts, militaria, weapons and medals. During the interwar period, a new section was created for Polish art (painting, sculpture and graphics), with a special emphasis on local artists. The museum has an extensive collection of Polish and European artistic crafts, including items made of tin from the twelfth to twentieth centuries, porcelain, faience and tiles from the sixteenth to twentieth centuries and clocks. There are approximately 40,000 coins in the museum's collection. In addition, there are folk art items from the ethnographic regions of Paluki, Kociewie and Kaszuby.
The museum occupies a special place among Polish museums thanks to the collection inherited after the death of Leon Wyczolkowski (1852-1936), a painter and graphic artist, whose works are considered to be some of the most important in late nineteenth and early twentieth century Polish art. The artist's widow donated paintings, drawings and graphics to the museum, as well as many personal effects and furnishings from his atelier. This collection was then complemented by other works and memorabilia donated by the family of one of his close friends. When the museum reopened in 1946 after the war on Wyczolkowski's birthday, 11 April it was renamed in the painter's honour. The artist's section in the museum currently has 700 works by the artist. There are also paintings, drawings, graphics and sculptures from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, particularly those of Polish artists working after 1945, which now are housed in the Gallery of Modern Polish Painting, considered one of the most comprehensive in the country.
The section of the museum devoted to Wyczolkowski's life and work is housed in the main building, a nineteenth-century reconstruction of a seventeenth-century monastery. Other exhibits are organised in two old granaries on Mill Island (Wyspa Mlynska). The "Red Granary" holds the modern art collection, and the "White Granary", at 2 Mennica Street, holds the archaeological, numismatic and ethnographic collections, as well as a permanent exhibit on craftsmanship, both practical and artistic.
Muzeum Okręgowe im. Leona Wyczółkowskiego w Bydgoszczy
ul. Gdańska 4
85-006 Bydgoszcz
Region: woj. kujawsko-pomorskie
Phone/Fax: (+48 52) 585 98 16
WWW: www.muzeum.bydgoszcz.pl
Email: muzeum@muzeum.bydgoszcz.pl