Author Description

What do the sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen (1770-1844), the Symbolist Jens Ferdinand Willumsen (1863-1958), and the artist Asger Jorn (1914-1973) have in common besides the international outlook that made them leave their Danish motherland? They lived in different eras, yet built up vast collections that echo as well as pollinate their own artistic practice in similar ways. Thorvaldsen was known for his expertise in antique art, Willumsen as an El Greco expert, and Jorn--a co-founder of COBRA and the Situationist International--strove to make modern art accessible to a broad audience. All three of these artists' art collections, now in public museums, each carry an individual style that does not espouse collecting art chronologically, but rather intuitively. This uniquely designed catalogue presents the artists' different approaches to collecting, which shook up the museum landscapes of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.