NORDIC DREAMS

n 1896, after eight years spent living in Paris, Anders Zorn returned to Mora, the small town in Sweden where he had been born and raised. His portraiture, deft and full of life, had won him an international reputation among the upper classes on both sides of the Atlantic, and his plein air paintings had earned him the Légion d’Honneur prize at the 1889 World’s Fair in Paris. But Zorn, who had grown up poor, felt a deep connection to the rural life of Mora and the Dalarna province as a whole, and after his return dedicated himself to painting the land, its people, and their folkways. He had strong ideas about the virtues of country life and old customs, and although the house he and his wife built for themselves was equipped with the most modern conveniences, the Zorns made it their project to preserve local culture, collecting handcrafts and folkloric objects and eventually starting their own museum,