Collection of the East Prussian State museum with a Baltic German Department

On the basis of its extensive collections, the East Prussian state museum (OL) preserves, researches and communicates the cultural heritage, history and landscape of East Prussia and the Baltic States, with a focus on the cultural history of the Baltic Germans. Objects from the fields of history, cultural history and natural history are displayed in a number of exhibition areas. One focal point of the collection is art and cultural historical objects from the above-mentioned regions. The OL exhibits precious gold and amber works, but also works of art from the Königsberg Academy of Art and the artists' colony in . The museum has several thousand paintings and graphic artworks. In addition, the exhibition also deals with the eventful history of the region up until its decline. The collection includes classical cultural-historical pieces and also some archival pieces from the Middle Ages to the present. The 20th century focal points are, in particular, the two world wars, the crimes of National Socialism and the subsequent flight and expulsion of almost the entire German population, as well as their integration in post-war Germany. A separate section presents the history of the Baltic Germans in their historical settlement areas of , , and  from the Middle Ages to the resettlement in 1939.

In addition, the specialized library contains around 15,000 titles on East and , as well as on the German-Baltic settlement areas and topics relating to the integration of displaced persons after 1945. Biographies, prose and poetry of people from the mentioned regions form an important part of the library. The basic stock for the collection came from the OL’s predecessor institution, the East Prussian Hunting Museum (1958–1986), with holdings related to hunting, forestry, agriculture and horse breeding in East Prussia. The holdings of the Museum Stadt Königsberg in Duisburg, which was dissolved in 2016, also form part of the collection. The library is used by the neighboring Nordostinstitut (IKGN e.V.).