Birger Sandzen Paintings

A wonderful 1949 oil painting on panel by Birger Sandźen depicting a farmhouse in a Lindsborg, Kansas landscape with hay shocks, trees and clouds. Cori North of the Birger Sandzén M...

Birger Sandzen (1871-1954) Kansas / Colorado Artist Image Size: 40.5 x 48 Frame Size: 49.5 x 57 Hand carved gold leaf frame. Medium: Oil "The Flint Hills" Has his daughter's name on the verso. This painting was donated to Bethany college by Birger's Daughter. The college owned it for many years and then about 8 years ago it was sent to auction. It sold to an art dealer from Santa Fe, it was acquired from a gallery by a friend of mine who has owned it since that time. Biography Birger Sandzen (1871-1954) Born Blidsberg, Sweden, Feb. 5, 1871; died Lindsborg, June 19, 1954. Painter, specialized in landscapes. Etcher. Engraver. Lithographer. Teacher. Attended the College and Academy of Skara as a pupil of Olof Erlandsson. After graduation from Skara College, Sandzén spent a semester at Lund University attending art history lectures and continuing the study of French. Following Lund University he went to the technical high school at Stockholm, where he studied perspective and form drawing. Sandzén joined a group of young artists and they rented a studio at Anders Zorn's suggestion. They received instruction from Zorn as well as Richard Bergh, a well-known portrait painter and Per Hasselberg, one of Sweden's best sculptors. Sandzén then went to Paris to study with Aman Jean, where he began to associate with American students in the French studies. On returning home in 1894, a family friend sent Sandzén a booklet about Bethany College, Lindsborg and the town called "Little Sweden." Sandzén moved to Lindsborg in 1894 to teach French, voice, art history, drawing and painting at Bethany College where he remained on the faculty until 1946. He first painted in the Colorado Springs, CO area in 1916, and became a frequent visitor to Santa Fe and Taos, NM beginning in 1918. Sandzén spent the summers of 1923-24 teaching at the Broadmoor Academy in Colorado Springs (presently the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center). Sandzén also taught at Chappell House (the forerunner to the Denver Art Museum), Utah State Agricultural College, Stephens College, the University of Michigan, and the 188 Kansas City Art Institute. Sandzén's style of painting is unusual in its thick and heavy application of impasto in bold and bright color combinations, interpreting the landscape of the western United States. He is known for very colorful renderings of mountain lakes with boulders, cypress and aspen trees and moonrises along waterways. Sandzén was an important advocate for art in the region, spending time talking to people about art, organizing exhibitions and establishing art clubs. He donated artwork to the local art club to help raise money for the purchasing of art books for the library, the financing of exhibitions, and the occasional awarding of a scholarship. He painted murals for the Halstead Post Office, Where Kit Carson Camped, in 1941, for the Lindsborg Post Office, Smoky River, in 1938, and for the Belleville Post Office, Kansas Stream, in 1939. He illustrated three books, With Brush and Pencil (1905), In the Mountains, (1925), The Smoky Valley, (1922). SOURCES: Susan Craig, "Biographical Dictionary of Kansas Artists (active before 1945)" Lindquist, Emory Kempton. Birger Sandzén: An Illustrated Biography. (Lawrence University Press of Kansas, 1993); American Magazine of Art, (Jan. 1927); International Studio ( Apr. 1923); Kansas Teacher (Nov. 1927); Greenough, Charles P. The Graphic Work of Birger Sandzén. (Lindsborg : Bethany College, 1952); Fielding, Mantle. Mantle Fielding’s Dictionary of American Painters, Sculptors and Engravers, with an Addendum containing Corrections and Additional Material on the Original Entries. Compiled by James F. Carr. New York: James F. Carr Publ., 1965.; Newlin, Gertrude Dix (Development of Art in Kansas. Typed Manuscript, 1951); Sain, Lydia. Kansas Artists, compiled by Lydia Sain from 1932 to 1948. Typed Manuscript, 1948.; WW26-27; American Art Annual. New York: American Federation of Arts, 1898-194727; Who’s Who in American Art. New York: American Federation of Arts, 1936- v.1=1936-37 v.3= 1941-42 v.2=1938-39 v.4=1940-47. 1, 2, 3, 4; Reinbach, Edna, comp. “Kansas Art and Artists”, in Collections of the Kansas State Historical Society. v. 17, 1928. p. 571-585.; A &C KS por il.; Dunbier, Paul. The Dunbier Value Guide; Over 1200 Painters in the Western U.S. Before 1920. Scottsdale: Altamira Press, 1981.; Dawdy, Doris Ostrander. Artists of the American West: A Biographical Dictionary. Chicago: Swallow Press, 1974. Wiebe, Joanna K. “Kansans Cared About their New Deal Art”, in Wichita Eagle Beacon, May 21, 1972. p.1E & 7E-----. “Local Legends Live in Art”, in Wichita Eagle Beacon, May 22, 1972. p.1A & 3A-----. “Age Enhances Fort Scott Mural”, in Wichita Eagle Beacon, May 23, 1972. p.1A & 8A-----. “Halstead Legend Perpetuated”, in Wichita Eagle Beacon, May 24, 1972. p.1A & 16A -----. “Scenics, Murals and Lithographs Included in Kansas New Deal Art”, in Wichita Eagle Beacon, May 25, 1972. p.15A.; Samuels, Peggy. Illustrated Biographical Encyclopedia of Artists of the American West. Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Co., 1976.; Snow, Florence. “Kansas Art and Artists”, in Kansas Teacher Aug-Sept. 1927, p.18-19; Oct. 1927, p.10, 12; Nov. 1927, p.11-12; Dec. 1927, p.7-8; Jan. 1928, p. 14-15; Feb. 1928, p.20-21; Mar. 1928, p.10-12; Apr. 1928, p. 16-17; May 1928, p.14, 16; June-July 1928, p.13-14.; American Art Annual. New York: American Federation of Arts, 1898-194724/12/18/20/22; KAC; Dawdy 2: Dawdy, Doris Ostrander. Artists of the American West: A Biographical Dictionary. Volume 2. Chicago: Swallow Press, 1981.; Annual Exhibition of the Artists of Kansas City and Vicinity (Kansas City Art Institute, 1915-21) 1915, 1917, 1920-21; Midwestern Artists’ Exhibition (Kansas City: Kansas City Art Institute, 1920-1942 Mines, Cynthia. For the Sake of Art: The Story of an Art Movement in Kansas. s.l. Mines, 1979.) 1922-23, 1925. 1929-33, 1935-40; Beach; Porter, Dean A, Teresa Hayes Ebie, Suzan Campbell. Taos Artists and Their Patrons, 1898-1950. South Bend, IN: Snite Museum of Art, 1999.; Bruner, Ronald Irwin. New Deal Art Workers in Colorado, Kansas and Nebraska. Thesis. University of Denver, 1979.; 100 Years of Art...