Inside Sandzen Spring 2010

INSIDE SANDZÉN
This feature, highlighting a discovery relating to Sandzén from the archives, will be periodically updated on the website and is planned for each issue of Gallery Notes.

"Inside Sandzén" for Spring 2010

After 26 more Swedish letters are catalogued in the computer database from the regular Archival correspondence files, the total catalogued Swedish letters will be 3,128. Thereafter copies of about 325 Sandzén letters to the noted Swedish sculptor Carl Milles will be catalogued in the database and then filed in the regular Correspondence files.

These items were copied from the Milles home library archives in Stockholm at the time of the research for Birger Sandzén: An Illustrated Biography, by Emory K. Lindquist. Now the letters have been professionally bound and moved to the well-guarded Rare Book Room in the Royal Library in Stockholm. The Gallery's copies are available to those who read Swedish even before they are catalogued.

A few of the letters are written to Milles in Swedish by Birger Sandzén's brother Gustaf, and preliminary work on the collection has identified two letters in English from Margaret Sandzén to Carl Milles. These two already have been added to the English database and the Correspondence files.

One of these, a letter of thanks for a Swedish costume sent by Carl and Olga Milles from Stockholm, was written September 9, 1930. Margaret continued to enjoy the costume throughout her life, and many continue to enjoy it on display in the Gallery, primarily during special Swedish exhibitions. Margaret's first paragraphs are quoted below.

* * * * *

We have been home [from summer in the mountains] exactly one week now, and it is therefore exactly one week that I have been enjoying my costume. A thousand thanks! Tusen tack! Den är hrälig, förjusande, charmant [glorious, delightful, charming]! It is by far the most beautiful costume I have ever seen--and to think that it is mine!

The embroidery and lace-work is perfectly exquisite--the whole thing is made absolutely perfectly. I know now why those dear ladies were always spoken of as being dignified--one couldn't very well be given to frivolity with such a dignified headdress on, heavy skirt, and stern bodice. Five minutes after I had unwrapped it, I had it on, showing myself to every one in Lindsborg!

* * * * *

Almost all the letter has been published in the Spring 2010 issue of Gallery Notes, distributed to all members.