Last year, the Art Museum of Estonia was visited by 388,600 art lovers

In 2025, the Art Museum of Estonia’s branches, exhibitions and public programmes were visited by 388,600 art lovers.Over the course of the year, the number of visitors to the Art Museum of Estonia increased significantly. While art lovers visited our museums about 350,000 times each in 2023 and 2024, last year there were 38,600 more visitors.

“It has been a successful year for the Art Museum of Estonia. The diverse exhibitions, featuring exceptional works from both our own collections and from international museums, were well executed, have been important for the museum’s content and have also attracted the public. This balance is important for the Art Museum of Estonia. The increase in international interest and visitor numbers is a sign of success. I would like to emphasise that this success is the result of the hard work of all departments of the museum, because behind every event stands the museum as a whole,” said Sirje Helme, Director General of the Art Museum of Estonia.

One of the most significant events for the Art Museum of Estonia last year was the exhibition Spiegel im Spiegel: Encounters between Estonian and German Art from Lucas Cranach to Arvo Pärt and Gerhard Richter, which opened in the Lipsiusbau Exhibition Hall in Dresden. The exhibition, organised in collaboration between the Dresden State Art Collections (Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden) and the Art Museum of Estonia, is currently on display at the Kumu Art Museum.

The international promotion of Estonian art will continue this year: in March, a large exhibition of Konrad Mägi’s works will open at the Dulwich Picture Gallery in London, featuring more than fifty works from the Art Museum of Estonia, the Tartu Art Museum and private collections. The exhibition will also include a contemporary art intervention by Kristina Õllek. In early April, an exhibition focusing on the work of Olga Terri, Anu Põder and Kris Lemsalu will open at the Musée d’Art Moderne in Paris.

Last year, the Kumu Art Museum opened its first exhibition created specifically for children. The playful exhibition Tu and Whozzy expands on the permanent exhibition of older Estonian art Identity Landscapes: Estonian Art 1700‒1945 and invites visitors to discover, together with the characters Tu and Whozzy, how art reflects our nature, helping us to better understand ourselves and others.

The Kadriorg Art Museum celebrated its 25th anniversary last year. In addition to international exhibitions, special attention was paid to families with children: the museum now has a fun activity room, exhibition activity points, and a theatrical audio guide. Last year, the Kadriorg Art Museum also opened a Cabinet of Prints: an exhibition space that expands the permanent exhibition and showcases the treasures of the rich collection of foreign graphic arts.

In the spring of 2025, the Niguliste Museum launched the concert series Art Sounds. The musical events combine art and music, and feature both Estonian and internationally renowned musicians and curators. The series is based on the treasures of medieval art and the exhibition programme of the Niguliste Museum. Three concerts have taken place so far, and the Art Sounds series will continue this year.

Alongside all its new and international activities, the Art Museum of Estonia has not forgotten its work with Estonian art history. The highly successful exhibition at the Kumu Art Museum about the Mei sisters showed that well-presented heritage appeals to the public just as much as the dazzling present.

Last year, the visitors loved such exhibitions as Enn Põldroos: Museum of Obsessions, The Mei Sisters: Avant-garde and the Everyday Life, and Ragnar Kjartansson: A Boy and a Girl and Bush and Bird at the Kumu Art Museum, Bernardo Strozzi: Beyond Caravaggio at the Kadriorg Art Museum, Estonian Book 500: Relics at the Niguliste Museum, Sooster 100: View from Private Collections at the Mikkel Museum, and Azulejos: The Pearls of Portugal at the Adamson-Eric Museum.

Some of the past year’s most popular exhibitions are still open for visiting: Spiegel im Spiegel: Encounters between Estonian and German Art from Lucas Cranach to Arvo Pärt and Gerhard Richter (until 12 April) and Mari Kurismaa: Twilight Geometry (until 22 February). The Niguliste Museum is hosting Dives Toletana: Treasures of Toledo Cathedral from the Medieval to El Greco (until 29 March). The Kadriorg Art Museum is offering visitors an opportunity to see the exhibition Garden of Delights: The Seventeenth Century in Bloom, which provides viewers with a rich overview of floral imagery in Dutch art.

See the exhibitions opening at the Art Museum of Estonia in 2026 here.