6984

Study portrait

Baroness Marga Marie Hilda and Baroness Dorothée Eveline Emma Schröder 1908

Seated half-length beside one another: Marga to the left, Dorothée to the right, wearing white high-necked blouses and blue ribbons in their hair

Oil on board, 101.5 x 76 cm (40 x 30 in.)

Inscribed upper left:  DOROTHE [sic] / MARGA 

Inscribed lower right: P.A. László / 1908   

Private Collection

The present painting was the first of some twenty portraits that de László painted of the Schröder family over the years from 1908 to 1935.

According to the sitters’ mother, Baroness Emma von Schröder, she had first come across de László’s work at the art publishers Hanfstaengl^[1] whom she had visited, probably in the autumn of 1907, with a view to having a reproduction made of Franz von Lenbach’s portrait of her grandmother Tina Joest. There she saw a photogravure of de László’s 1903 portrait of Joseph Joachim [5847], an old family friend,^[2] and obtained through Hanfstaengl the artist’s address. On 27 November 1907 Emma first wrote^[3] to de László asking if she might visit him in his London studio with a view to commissioning a portrait. She and her husband, Baron Bruno Schröder, were greatly impressed and invited de László to their house, Dell Park, near Windsor, to discuss his painting her portrait. It was there that de László met the two daughters of the house, Dorothée and Marga, and claiming that he had not much time to paint a formal portrait of the baroness, he stated that, nevertheless, he would “love to do [the] two girls”^[4] as he was having an exhibition in Berlin in a few months and wished to show the double portrait there. “I have ever since chaffed him about this,” she wrote, “how he tried to avoid painting my portrait, choosing my two nice girls instead!”^[5]

De László’s first attempt, however, was not a success and he later wanted to use the back of the abandoned board for his second portrait of the German Emperor’s daughter, Princess Victoria Luise. The Empress remarked that this was a pity as the double portrait was nearly finished and de László was obliged to start the princess’s portrait again [5092]. In 1910 Emma Schröder remarked that she thought the likeness of Marga excellent and suggested de László paint out Dorothée’s head, leaving a single portrait of Marga. He was not satisfied with this either, so made an extra sketch of Marga [6996]. The eventual fate of the first double portrait is unknown.

The second version was exhibited to great acclaim in Berlin, the German Empress remarking to de László when she saw the portrait: “Yes I can see that they are the children of Baron and Baroness Schröder, as the one has the eyes of her father and the other has the hair and blue eyes of the Baroness.”^[6] The portrait of Emma Schröder was painted the following year [6942].

De László made a second portrait of Dorothée in 1915 [6979], and painted her again in 1923 on the occasion of her marriage [6982].

For biographical details on the sitters, see [6979] for Dorothée and [6996] for Marga.

EXHIBITED:    

•Galerie Schulte, Berlin, 1908

•The Dowdeswell Galleries, London, An Exhibition of Portraits by Philip A. László, June and July, 1908, no. 7

•Christie’s, King Street, London, A Brush with Grandeur, 6-22 January, 2004, no. 39

LITERATURE:          

•Schleinitz, Otto (von), Künstler Monographien Ph A.v. László, Bielefeld and Leipzig, (Velhagen & Klasing), 1913,

p. 112, ill. p. 87, pl.103

•Schröder, Baroness Emma von, Description of Dell Park, 1934-37, unpublished

•De Laszlo, Sandra, ed., & Christopher Wentworth-Stanley, asst. ed., A Brush with Grandeur, Paul Holberton Publishing, London 2004, p. 103, ill.

•Grever, Tonko and Annemieke Heuft (Sandra de Laszlo, British ed.), De László in Holland: Dutch Masterpieces by Philip Alexius de László (1869-1937), Paul Holberton publishing, London, 2006, p. 20, ill.

•Field, Katherine ed., Transcribed by Susan de Laszlo, The Diaries of Lucy de László Volume I: (1890-1913), de Laszlo Archive Trust, 2019, p. 135, ill.

•DLA066-0132, letter from Emma von Schröder to de László, 24 November 1907

•DLA066-0133, letter from Emma von Schröder to de László, 12 March [1908]

•László, Lucy de, 1908 diary, 2 June entry, p. 178

•DLA066-0068, letter from Emma von Schröder to de László, 5 August 1908

•DLA066-0071, letter from Emma von Schröder to de László, 5 February 1909

CWS 2008