111922

Countess Clothilde Apponyi 1897

Seated three-quarter length to the left, her head turned towards the viewer full face; wearing a white gown, a decorated diadem in her dark hair, a single strand pearl necklace, emerald earrings and a matching brooch, holding a pair of gloves in her lap, a lace stole on a small table to the left

Oil on canvas, 120 x  99 cm (47 ¼  x 39 in.)

Inscribed lower right: László f / Éberhard 1897

Upper left: Part of the Apponyi de Nagyappony coat of arms, a shield with a lion on the left and another shield with a Moor’s head with a white rose in her mouth on the right, a coronet above

Sitters’ Book I, opp. f. 33: Gróf Apponyi Albertné / Mensdorff Klotilde Grófnő

Sitters’ Book I, opp. f. 54: Apponyi Albertné

Private Collection

De László exhibited his portraits of the Mailáth [110810][13008] and Ratibor families [10502][110799] at the 1897 Spring Exhibition of the Hungarian Fine Arts Society with great success and it is probable that Count Albert Apponyi then decided to commission a portrait of himself [2438] and his wife to celebrate their recent marriage. The portraits were painted in late summer at Éberhard,^[1] the Apponyi family’s country estate near Pozsony^[2] and were exhibited at the Winter Exhibition of the Hungarian Fine Art Society.

Dr Adolf Silberstein, the art critic of Pester Lloyd, praised both pictures: “what a contrast is the wonderful noble appearance of his [Apponyi’s] wife of this man who appears in such a simple exterior; the Countess is all grace and grandeur, shimmering with light and adorned with all the charms of youth and her spirit; we have to praise the fact that the artist dealt with all the details of her clothes; it does no harm to the diamond to be presented in the right setting; If László undoubtedly made extensive studies with Lenbach, he did not neglect Benczur [sic] and Horowitz either. This can be clearly seen in his darker treatment of Apponyi and his ivory-like shimmering countess”^[3] 

During de László’s visit to Éberhard he also painted a head and shoulder study of the sitter wearing the same dress and jewellery as in the present portrait [110863], dated 3 September, and another more informal study portrait [112170]. He also painted a small landscape study dated 12 August [112821].

In January 1900 the artist returned to Éberhard to paint the Count [111921] and Countess [111923] and her brother, Count Albert Mensdorff-Pouilly-Dietrichstein (1861-1945) [112825][112197] who was serving as Austro-Hungarian Ambassador to the Court of St James’s in London.^[4]

The present picture hung in Count Apponyi’s study at Éberhard, where it was photographed and illustrated in Vasárnapi Újság in 1907. Following the Treaty of Trianon in 1919, the family lost the castle and estate and it became an agricultural school in 1923.

De László painted the sitter’s brother, Count Albert Mensdorff-Pouilly-Dietrichstein on three more occasions: 1902 [110975], 1905 [4697] and 1908 [4694]. In 1902, he also painted the sitter’s elder brother Hugo von Mensdorff-Pouilly, 2nd Fürst von Dietrichstein (1858-1920) [4884] and his wife, née Princess Olga Dolgoruky (1873-1946) with their four-year-old son Alexander (1899-1964) [4886]. He painted Fürstin von Dietrichstein again in 1907 [5628].

Countess Clotilde Dietrichstein-Mensdorff-Pouilly was born on 23 December 1867 in Vienna, daughter of Count Alexander Mensdorff-Pouilly (1813-1871), Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister-President of Austria and cousin of Queen Victoria, and his wife née Countess Alexandrine Dietrichstein-Proskau-Leslie (1824-1906). As a young woman she was invested as a Dame of the Order of the Starry Cross to the Imperial Court in Vienna. On 1 March 1897 she married politician Count Albert Apponyi (1846-1933) in Vienna. more than twenty years her senior. The proud groom, who had a great self-deprecating sense of humour, commented that it was thanks to the Countess’s bad taste that she reciprocated his affection.^[5] After a short honeymoon in Weidling, the couple moved to Éberhard where they lived until 1901 when Count Apponyi was elected the Speaker of the Parliament, after which they moved to Budapest.^[6] 

There were three children of the marriage: a son, György (born 1898), and two daughters, Marika (born 1899) and Júlia (born 1903). Countess Apponyi spoke perfect Hungarian and used it exclusively with her family. She was a prominent advocate of women’s rights and women’s suffrage and became involved in various women's associations. She represented Hungary at the League of Nations as a deputy delegate between 1928 and 1934 and was a delegate between 1935 and 1937. She was a persuasive debater with great diplomatic skill. She died in Budapest on 1 September 1943.

PROVENANCE:

Sold at Nagyházi Galéria és Aukciósház, Budapest, December 2023

EXHIBITED:

•Hungarian Fine Art Society, Téli kiállítás [Winter Exhibition], Budapest 1897/98

•Galerie Schulte, Berlin, 1898                                                                                                                   

•Künstlerhaus, Annual Exhibition, Vienna, 1898, no. 1534

LITERATURE:         

•Polacsek, Ernst, Ausstellung bei Schulte, Berliner Neueste Nachrichten, 27 February 1898, p. 1

•Egy magyar művész sikerei Berlinben [The success of a Hungarian artist in Berlin], Budapesti Napló, Budapest, 8 March 1898

•Vasárnapi Újság, vol. 31, issue 54, Budapest, 4 August 1907, pp. 614, 616, ill.

•Pethő, Sándor, Count Albert Apponyi, 1926, Budapest, p. 49, ill.

•Rutter, Owen, Portrait of a Painter, 1939, London, pp. 158, 238

•Field, Katherine ed., Transcribed by Susan de Laszlo, The Diaries of Lucy de László Volume I: (1890-1913), de Laszlo Archive Trust, 2019, p. 114

•Field, Katherine, Philip Alexius de László; 150th Anniversary Exhibition, de Laszlo Archive Trust, 2019, p. 9

•Field, Katherine ed., Gábor Bellák and Beáta Somfalvi, Philip de László (1869-1937); "I am an Artist of the World", Magyar Nemzeti Galéria, 2019, p. 18

•DLA140-0042, Vasárnapi Lapok, Budapest, 12 December 1897, p. 668, ill.

•DLA091-0007 Silberstein, Dr. Adolf, Winter exhibition at the Künstlerhaus, Pester Lloyd, 1897

•DLA091-0274, A téli képkiállítás [The Winter Exhibition], Magyar Újság, undated

•DLA090-0042, German press cutting, undated

BS

2024