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09/22/2008: "Zorn"
In 1989, a close friend and extraordinary artist, Alex Fournier, told me to take in a show at the IBM Gallery of Art and Science in Manhattan. “Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida is an incredible painter,” Alex told me. I happened to be in NYC shortly thereafter, a rainy cold winter mid-week day, and recalled my friend’s suggestion. I don’t remember what I thought before I entered the Gallery, but the paintings I saw that day changed my life. I was literally high on color, light, the mastery of a great master. I bought every book that I could get my hands on and that summer fortuitously went to Spain on a planned family vacation to seek out Sorolla’s work in person. As luck would have it, Sorolla’s home in Madrid is a museum of his work. He also painted murals in the Spanish Institute in NYC. However, it was in Spain that I could have an inkling of the light under which Sorolla painted to create his impressionistic “luministic” (as Henri Rochefort described the paintings) masterpieces. And throughout the experiences I had that year, the name Anders Zorn kept popping up. Sorolla and Zorn were friends (and friendly with John Singer Sargent, as well) as well as colleagues who sought to capture their worlds in Spain and in Sweden, respectively, using light, color and the impressions that they garnered from their environments.
The Metropolitan Museum in NYC had only one of Zorn’s works on display, but I learned that the Isabella Gardner Museum had a collection of Zorn’s paintings as Gardner was a patron or the Swedish painter. I traveled to Boston and was just as taken with Zorn’s work as I had been with Sorolla’s. It became my passionate goal to see Zorn’s paintings in Sweden where he had lived and worked for most of his life. Dreams do come true: in May 2008, my son, Joe, treated me to a trip to Sweden to find Zorn: his influence, his paintings, the light that pervades his work and world.
We arrived in Stockholm to find a light not unlike the light I experience at my home in New Hampshire. However, everywhere there is water. The light and water influence the colors and feeling of the place. That first day, I raced around Stockholm, camera in hand, and that evening we took a boat ride around one of the large lakes in the Stockholm area. As opposed to Madrid, the light is softer, more defused, the colors gentler and the forms less sharply defined. The weather was perfect: a balmy 70 degrees F in contrast to my July visit to Spain where the mercury climbed to 110 degrees F on July days. The light reflected the heat in Spain and Sweden. Shadows, space and form: all responding to and expressing the light. 
The following two days we sought out Zorn’s paintings in various venues in Stockholm, two of which was an auction houses that had some superb examples of Zorn’s work: both paintings and etchings. I was also reacquainted with Bruno Liljefors’ marvelous paintings of animals and birds which I had studied from reproductions in books when I was a dog portrait painter. Both painters along with Carl Larson are highly revered in Sweden. We spent a wonderful day at the Thielska Gallery: the home of Ernest Thiel, a wealthy banker who knew Zorn and avidly collected his paintings. The mansion, which is quite impressive, is in a lovely park-like area about a half hour outside of downtown Stockholm. We walked around a beautiful lake to the museum which was filled with the paintings, etchings and drawings of Anders Zorn. The mansion was a beautiful place in which to view the art as it was well lit and displayed the works to maximize their visual appeal. We also visited the National Gallery in Stockholm, which was hosting a large Toulouse-Lautrec retrospective. There are two major work’s by Zorn in the collection and we were glad to spend some time viewing them in solitude as most other visitors were at the Lautrec exhibition. 
After extraordinary days in Stockholm, we rented a car and drove to Zorn’s house and museum in the resort town of Mora which is about four and a half hours North of Stockholm. It is a beautiful drive through the Swedish landscape which abounds with towering pines, lakes and, of course, the incredibly soft and luminous light. We arrived in Mora late in the day and walked around yet another lake at twilight: 9pm. Shimmering water and incandescent sky. A softness in the air and the scent of pine and grass: like early morning in the spring/summers of my childhood. There was a magic feel to the place: suspended in time.
The next day we were given a tour of Zorn’s beautiful art filled home which is painstakingly preserved: it is like he will appear at any moment and invite you to have a cup of coffee and discuss art: incredible feeling of the presence of the person. It was an incredibly wonderful feeling and not at all a shrine-like atmosphere. More of an homage to the man and his wife, Emma, who played a significant role in his life. Zorn had many interests: central heating of the house, the dinnerware, and tapestries which he commissioned from local artisans. Zorn designed the furniture, which he also had made locally. There are paintings by his friend Carl Larson, himself and other artists. It was an unparalleled experience to see Zorn’s private life as an extension of his art.
Next door to the house is a modern structure whose design was overseen by Zorn’s wife, Emma Lamm Zorn, after his death (He predeceased her by many years). She had managed to purchase a good number of Zorn’s paintings from owner’s world- wide after Zorn’s death with the intension of creating a museum. It is a beautiful gem of a museum: clean lines, well lit, designed to showcase the art. The art is fabulous. Each painting a tribute to the mastery of technique, the ever present light, the subject matter. A visual banquet. Additionally, one can see Zorn’s studio ( a separate building) and the numerous old wooden, Swedish rural structures that Zorn collected throughout the property. 
Anders Zorn painted what he saw with his incredibly discerning eye in the magic light of Sweden: villagers, water, his wife and friends, the landscape. His paintings and home are well preserved by Jonah Cederlund, the curator of the Zorn Museum and a author of a magnificent book about Swedish architecture: Classical Swedish Architecture and Interiors: 1650-1830. Mr. Cederlund and his staff were most gracious to Joe and me, making our journey that much more special. The trip of a lifetime!! Thanks, Joe!! 
