Picture lending has, at different times and in different places, been championed by individuals who have regarded it — with some difference of emphasis and interpretation — as a means both of helping artists and of bringing art into people’s lives. Ten such individuals are profiled: Heinrich Schulz; the more radical Otto Nagel, and Rudolf Bosselt, who were active in Germany in the 1920s and 1930s; Franz Roh and Eva Pietzsch, whose work continued into the post-War period in West Germany; Pieter Kooistra, founder of the SBK network in the Netherlands; Knud Pedersen in Denmark; Karl-Heinz Bolay, who became a leading librarian in Sweden; and Heinz Werner and Isolde PreiBler, who championed the cause of picture lending in East Germany, in circumstances which imposed severe limitations on what could be achieved until German unification opened up new possibilities. (An English version follows the German original).