During its long life, The Print Center has worked closely with the Philadelphia Museum of Art to encourage the study and appreciation of prints and photographs. The prints in Prized Impressions have been selected from more than one thousand works on paper given to the Museum by The Print Center and its members over the past seventy years. From its beginnings as The Print Club (founded in 1915), the Philadelphia institution now familiar as The Print Center has sought to acquaint the general public with fine prints of all periods, to promote the collection and exhibition of historic and contemporary prints, and to provide a meeting place for artists and print enthusiasts alike.

Each year since 1929, prizewinning prints and (since the late 1970s) photographs from The Print Center's annual juried exhibitions have been offered as gifts to the Museum. Beginning in 1942, a special collection of important Old Master and contemporary prints was formed at the Museum with funds contributed by Print Center members. The European and American prints shown here are a lively mix of artistic masterpieces and technically innovative work, which provide a survey of the history of printmaking and chronicle the long-term relationship enjoyed by The Print Center and Museum.