f[5101
UNTRACED
Study portrait
Charlotte, Hereditary Princess of Saxe-Meiningen 1899
Head and shoulders, with her back to the viewer, looking down and to the right, wearing a white gown
Oil [support and dimensions unknown]
Inscribed lower right: László F.E. / 1899.
Sitters’ Book I, f. 27: Erinnerung grüszt durch Stürme / u Wetter, / Und schüchtern schreibt einen / Sonnenstrahl / Aufs rothe Gold der welcken / Blätter, / Es war einmal![1] / Charlotte / Erbprinzessin v. S. Meiningen / Prinzessin v. Preussen / Erdmannsdorf. 10terJuli / 1899.
Princess Charlotte was the eldest daughter of Crown Prince Friedrich of Prussia and his wife Victoria, Princess Royal of Great Britain. During the summer of 1899 de László painted three portraits of the sitter: the present portrait, a three-quarter-length portrait [12056] of the sitter seated in a cream dress wrapped in ermine and a bust-length portrait [12059] wearing a green dress with lace collar. These were the first in a long series of portraits the artist made of the German Imperial family between 1899 and 1911.
Sittings for the two formal portraits of Princess Charlotte were begun at Schloss Erdmannsdorf in July 1899. De László was unable to finish the three-quarter-length portrait before he had to leave and further sittings were arranged at Schloss Zülzhoff[2] in September while the artist was painting Count and Countess Hans Karl Schaffgotsch [7127][111901], close friends of Princess Charlotte. The present picture was painted at this time and remained in the possession of the artist. Between 1898 and 1899, the artist painted a number of study portraits to hang in his new studio house in Budapest. He refused to sell this picture until at least 1923, when it can be seen hanging on the wall in a photograph of his studio at 3 Fitzjohn’s Avenue. It does not appear in the inventory of his studio made after his death and it is presently untraced.[3]
The portrait was sent to Budapest with the portrait of the sitter’s husband Prince Bernhard of Saxe-Meiningen [110817] for the 1899 winter exhibition at the Hungarian Fine Art Society Nemzeti Szalon. De László’s friend and mentor Elek Lippich wrote: “I am impressed by the princess’s portrait. It's been a long time since I liked a picture by you as much as this, which is simple and nobly drawn.”[4] An article referring to the same exhibition also mentions this “noble, rather suggested than finished portrait.”[5] Alphonse Ridder de Stuers who saw it at an exhibition in The Hague in 1903 wrote to the artist: “The head of the Princess of Meiningen is very delicate and modest but the general public does not understand this.”[6]
For biographical notes on the sitter, see [12056].
PROVENANCE:
In the artist’s studio until at least 1923[7]
EXHIBITED:
•Kunstverein Frankfurt, 1899
•Württembergischer Kunstverein, Stuttgart, 1899[8] (could also refer to [12056] or [12059])
•Nemzet Szalon, Téli kiállítás [Winter Exhibition], 1899[9]
•Société des Beaux-Arts, Le salon: huitième exposition, Brussels, 1901 (this could also refer to [12059] or [12056])
•Pulchri Studio, The Hague, 1903[10]
•Vienna Künstlerhaus, Künstlerhaus Annual Exhibition, May-June 1904, n° 178[11]
•Künstlerhaus, XX. Jahresausstellung, Salzburg, 1904, no. 64
LITERATURE:
•”Főheregnők a műteremben” [Archduchesses in the Studio], Hazánk 24 April 1901, p. 8
•Vasárnapi Újság, vol. 48, issue 28, Franklin-Társulat, Budapest, 14 July 1901, p. 448-449, ill.
•The Studio Magazine, London, October 1901, Vol. XXIV (24), n° 103, pp. 2-22, ill. p. 4
•Vollmar, H., “Fülöp László,” Moderne Kunst, Vol. XVII, 1903, p. 246, ill.
•Les Modes, n° 27, 1903, ill.
•Schleinitz, Otto von, Künstler Monographien, n° 106, Ph. A. von László, Velhagen & Klasing, Bielfeld and Leipzig, 1913, p. 52, ill. pl. 39, p. 36
•Rutter, Owen, Portrait of a Painter, London, 1939, p.178
•NSzL150-0086, letter from de László to Elek Lippich, 16 September 1899
•DLA029-113, letter from Elek Lippich to de László, 1 December 1899
•NSzL150-0099, letter from de László to Elek Lippich, 12 December 1899
•DLA043-0046, Dr. Gabriel von Térey, “Die Winterausstellung im Künstlerhause”, Pester Lloyd, 20 December 1899
•DLA090-0033, German press cutting, [undated, presumably 1899]
•DLA091-0097, German newspaper article, [undated, presumably 1899]
•DLA140-0085, Kunst und Kunsthandwerk, vol. V, Vienna: von Artaria & co., 1900, p. 202, ill.
•DLA011-0003, letter from Alphonse Ridder de Stuers to de László, 16 April 1903
•DLA090-0168, German newspaper article, [undated, presumably 1904]
•DLA140-0138, Der Monal, July 1904, ill.
•DLA128-0002, letter from de László to Lucy de László, 20 December 1908
ATG 2014
BS 2023
[1] Memory beckons through storm and weather/ And timidly writes a sunray / On the red gold of the wilting leaves / It happened once upon a time!
[2] Now Sulisław, Poland
[3] NSzL150-0099, op. cit.
[4] DLA029-0113, op. cit.
[5] DLA091-0097, op. cit.
[6] DLA011-0003, op. cit.
[7] The portrait was not included in the artist’s studio inventory, which would indicate that it was not in his possession at the time of his death.
[8] See DLA090-0289 and DLA091-0012
[9] DLA091-0097 and DLA029-0113, op. cit.
[10] See DLA011-0003, op. cit.
[11] See DLA090-0168, most probably referring to the present portrait, as the artist was mainly exhibiting “his brilliant sketches … almost in negligé …devoid of all the deluding colouristical and traditional arts”, op. cit.