The collection began as part of the Dresden Painting Gallery. The purchase of contemporary works, creating the "Modern Department", was stepped up in 1843 under Bernhard von Lindenau, director of the Royal Museums, who personally donated 700 talers each year for this purpose. The Academic Council, responsible for the gallery and the Academy of Fine Arts, also contributed 50 percent of the proceeds from its exhibitions towards new purchases. However, these funds were only enough for limited acquisitions, mostly restricted to German works. Until 1882 the collection contained only four major German Romanticism works; two paintings by Caspar David Friedrich and two works by Ludwig Richter. It was subsequently expanded under director Karl Woermann. The gallery first started to buy foreign contemporary works following an international art exhibition in Dresden in 1897. Under Hans Posse, director from 1910, the gallery enlarged its collections of German Romanticism, Impressionism, and late 19th century "Civic Realism", which are still important today. The gallery was financially strengthened by the founding of the Dresden Museums Association in 1911 and the Patrons Association in 1917. In 1931, the Modern Department of the gallery with paintings from the 19th and 20th centuries moved into a separate building on Brühl's Terrace, laying the foundations for what is now known as the New Masters Gallery. The Nazi campaign against "degenerate art" resulted in the confiscation and sale of 56 paintings, including works by Edvard Munch, Max Beckmann and Emil Nolde. In the 1945 bombing of Dresden, 196 paintings were destroyed by fire while on a truck. The present-day New Masters Gallery was founded in 1959, and has been housed in the upper rooms of the Albertinum since 1965. Subsequently, the gallery was able to retrieve a number of works that had been lost during and after World War II. The floods of 2002 made it necessary to renovate the Albertinum and build a new flood-proof depot. The Albertinum reopened in June 2010 with an enlargement to the "Salzgasse Wing". Its rooms were once occupied by the Green Vault that was moved to the renovated Dresden Castle at that time. Special exhibitions of contemporary art are now held there.
The Society of Modern Art in Dresden, founded in 1994, raises funds for the purchase of new works and organises permanent loans to the museum. Through its support, more than 30 works have been acquired and several exhibitions funded.
