Birger Sandzen

Art Brokerage: Sven Birger Sandzen American Artist: b. 1871- 1954. Sandzen was born in Bildsberg, Sweden. In 1894, he emigrated to Kansas where until 1945 he was professor at Bethany College and from then until his death, professor emeritus. Not only did he paint in the West including Yellowstone National Park in 1930, he amassed a personal collection of over 500 western paintings and drawings. In 1916, he first went to Colorado and in the mid 1920s, taught some classes at the Broadmore Hotel. He also taught at Denver College and at Utah State College. From 1918, he became a regular visitor to Santa Fe and Taos, New Mexico, and in 1922, exhibited with the Taos Society of Artists in New York. During the Depression, he was a W.P.A. artist and was the author of a book titled With Brush and Pencil. "He was also a founding member of the Prairie Printmakers Society. In the 1930s, a handful of intaglio and block print artists from Wichita, Lawrence and El Dorado, Kansas met with Sandzen in his studio and under his direction created one of America's most successful print societies". Sven Birger Sandzen passed away in 1954.