The original Max Michaelis Gift was augmented in the later years by a smaller collection presented by Lady Michaelis, and by a number of subsequent acquisitions. It boasts works by acknowledged Dutch masters such as Frans Hals, Jan Steen, Jacob van Ruisdael, Jan van Goyen, Pieter de Hoogh, Abraham van Beyeren and Willem van Aelst, as well as Flemish artists such as Anthony van Dyck, David Teniers, Pieter Coecke van Aelst and Frans Snijders. 

Containing portraits and group portraits, still-lifes and interiors, landscapes, townscapes and marines, genre scenes and church interiors, it can now be regarded as one of the most comprehensive collections of its kind outside the Netherlands and a few of the major world capitals.