RON MICHAEL | The story of Birger Sandzén, the Swedish artist and Renaissance Man, who changed the color palette of American Art

I drove the Volvo and Airstream to Lindsborg in Kansas - a town still proud of its Swedish heritage - to talk with Ron Michael, Director of the Birger Sandzén Memorial Gallery, about the Swedish artist who put Kansas high on the American art scene. Birger Sandzén was born in Blidsberg, Sweden, in 1871. He studied art in Stockholm with Anders Zorn and Richard Berg and in Paris with Edmond François Aman-Jean. At the age of 23 (1894), he left Sweden for a teaching position at Bethany College in Lindsborg - where he remained for the remainder of his career. - Only 100 years apart! What makes this extra special is that Birger Sandzén's birthplace, "Blidsberg" is in the southern parts of the County where I was born (Skaraborg) almost 100 years later, and that this museum in the middle of Kansas shows a series of motifs from where I grew up: Skara, Läckö, and Kinnekulle.