Ett föredöme för modern konst.

When Alfred Lichtwark (1852-1914) was appointed director of the Hamburg Kunsthalle in 1886 he set about reorganising the museum's art collections in order to create a modern museum and pave the way for a cautious approach to impressionism. He invited to Hamburg for this purpose many avant-guarde artists from Germany and elsewhere such as Max Liebermann, Leopold von Kalckreuth, Pierre Bonnard, Edouard Vuillard and others, to paint local motifs. The Swedish painter Anders Zorn (1860-1920) was one of the first guests, being expected to give a model for modern colourism. His watercolour, The Port of Hamburg, was signed in 1891. Strangely enough, it was not integrated into the museum's collection until 1901. The first part of the present paper deals with the question of why Zorn's picture "disappeared" for a ten year period. Comparisons with other paintings that suffered a similar fate throughout the 1890's backed up by a study of archive material give an indication that Zorn's watercolour did not conform to the conservative tastes of the public at the time. So Zorn never became a famous name in connection with Hamburg's collection of local motifs. Nevertheless, The Port of Hamburg deserves attention because it seemes to shed a light on the cultural and political conflicts that Lichtwark had to face in order to support the development of modern art in Hamburg. On the other hand, as the second part of this paper points out, Lichtwark succeeded very effectively in introducing Zorn's engraved works as a model for modern art. The Kunsthalle collection of Zorn's etchings rose to international prominence. Famous personalities such as Gustav Schiefler and Aby Warburg supported Lichtwark's endeavour in this field. By 1910 the Hamburg Kunsthalle was in the position to own one of the most comprehensive German public collections of Zorn's etchings. The local press was also won over by Lichtwark's preferences and wrote frequently about Zorn's participation in various exhibitions. Influential privat collectors purchased Zorn's engraved works and the Commeter art gallery in Hamburg met demand for his etchings all over Germany. It is noteworthy that Zorn's art reached the pinnacle of its reputation at a time when the master engraver was no longer in the forefront of modern art. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]