11492

Self-portrait

Philip Alexius de László, when Laub Fülöp 1888

Head-and-shoulders in three-quarter profile to the left, head turned to and looking to the right, beyond the viewer, wearing a brown jacket over a white shirt and a broad blue bow tie

Oil on canvas, 42.5 x 32.5 cm (17 x 13 in.)

Inscribed, lower right: 888.  

Private Collection

For the first six months after entering the Academy, de László’s work was limited to drawing in pencil and chalks, and only later could he progress to painting in oils, and even then at first only in his free time. This is not only the earliest known self-portrait in oil, it is also one of the earliest works by de László to have survived. The pose, with the head turned over his shoulder to fix the viewer with a piercing gaze, was one he continued to favour for self-portraits.

1888 was a significant year. For the first time he had a picture, ‘The Goose Girl’ [111187], chosen for public exhibition. The following year he won a Hungarian State Scholarship and decided to go to Venice, but he contracted typhoid and very soon was forced to return to Budapest.

PROVENANCE:          

In the possession of the artist on his death

EXHIBITED:        

•Christie’s, King Street, London, A Brush with Grandeur, 6-22 January 2004, no. 2

LITERATURE:

•De Laszlo, Sandra, ed., & Christopher Wentworth-Stanley, asst. ed., A Brush with Grandeur, Paul Holberton publishing, London 2004, p. 68, ill.

CWS 2008