DLA002-0015  Translation

Budapest

VI Fasor 26

6th January 1903.

My dear Friend,

I have been informed that the court has summoned you to appear as a witness in the [illegible] case of the children’s portrait. You will be asked your views about certain statements made by Quittner. As after a passage of years one does not always remember things exactly, allow me to remind you of the essential points in your letter to me of 15th July 1901 written from Schloss Gutenstein and addressed to me in Amsterdam.  

In the letter that you wrote to me, the essential points are literally as follows:

“There was no talk of the idea that the payment of the honorarium should depend on my opinion”

Later there is the following:

“I know for certain that I looked at this picture with my customary objectivity, that I made comparisons, and my answer was that the likeness is not yet perfect, but that if you were to talk to my colleague B., he could easily correct this. However, the portrait as such is a distinguished one, of a high artistic standard, and it is a fine picture.”

That my letter should not be seen as wanting to influence you, I will not write anything further, but I hope that we shall soon be able to greet you in our ancestral home.

I send you my greetings | Your respectful friend

Ede Balló

Editorial Notes:

See DLA002-0016, letter from Ede Balló to de László, 30 March 1900, for the context of this letter. Also see DLA002-0022, letter from Ede Balló to de László, 15 July 1901.

Quittner is very probably Zsigmond Quittner (1859-1918). An architect, he worked in the Vienna Secession style; one of his best known buildings is the Gresham Palace in Pest, now the Four Seasons Hotel. He was president of the Hungarian Architects’ Association..

Ede Balló (1859-1936) was a well known Hungarian painter. He trained at the Mintarajziskola under Bertalan Székely,  at the Vienna Academy in 1881 and at the Munich Academy from 1882 to 1885. Worked in Madrid and Rome. Best known as a copyist of Velázquez and the Dutch masters. He was a professor at the Budapest Academy of Fine Arts from 1894 to 1923.

Pd’O  

23/03/2006