111095

UNTRACED
Study portrait

General István Türr 1897

Head and shoulders, head turned slightly to the left, looking to the viewer, wearing a white collar.

Oil [support and dimensions unknown]

Inscribed lower left: A FILIPPI GYŐZTESNEK / László F / 1897 / VI. [To the victor of Philippi^[1]]

Sitters’ Book I, opp. f. 15: Türr Gl [1899, and below general in the artist’s hand, twice underlined]

This painting is one of the earliest examples of the artist’s study portraits, a format characteristic of his portraiture in later years. The sitter’s face is fully finished, though with looser brushwork than in his early paintings, but the surroundings are merely sketched in or almost omitted.

De László first met this hero of the 19th century European revolutionary wars in the mid-1890’s at the home of his friend Emma Földváry, who was a leading figure in the fin de siècle literary salons of Budapest.^[2] Many years later, when he visited Budapest in 1935 to paint his second portrait of the Regent of Hungary, Admiral Horthy [110886], he nostalgically noted in his diary: “Luncheon - with Emma földváry^[3] - still the same House - in which I appeared - the first time on my return from Munich - met their - Count Vay de Vaya [5617] Bishop fraknoy [111904]  -  Hubay [4825] - Generall Türr - of whom I did a sketch - (The Hung: General who fought with Italy - Garibaldi for the [indistinct] of Italy.”^[4] 

The sitter had a remarkably adventurous life. He was born in Baja, southern Hungary, on 11 August 1825, the fifth child of Jakab Thier, an ironmonger, and his wife, Terézia Udvary. He tried his hand at various trades with little success. In 1842, aged 17, he joined the Austrian army and was soon promoted to the rank of lieutenant. He hungarianised his name to Türr and served in Lombardy under Marshal Radetzky. When the Hungarian revolution broke out in 1848 he found himself fighting on the wrong side. In January 1849 he crossed over to the Piedmontese and organised and commanded a Hungarian Legion fighting against the Austrians. After their defeat at Novara, he joined the revolution in Baden. They in turn were defeated by the Prussians, and between 1850 and 1853 Türr lived as an exile in France, England, Switzerland and Piedmont. He joined the Mazzini^[5] conspiracy, but after the failure of the uprising in Milan in February 1853 he was arrested and exiled to Tunisia. During the Crimean War (1853-1856) he served in the British army against Russia’s autocratic Tsar Nicholas I, who had helped Austria in 1849 to defeat the Hungarian revolution.

In 1855 he was sent on a mission to the Danube Principalities to secure supplies for the British forces. The Danube Principalities were under Austrian occupation at the time. He was betrayed, arrested and sentenced to death as a deserter. Through British intervention, in which Queen Victoria was personally involved, his sentence was commuted to perpetual exile. In 1859 he joined Garibaldi’s army and the following year he took part in the expedition to Sicily as Garibaldi’s Principal Adjutant. He was promoted to General and after the conquest of Naples he became military governor of the city. After the war King Victor Emmanuel II, confirmed him as a General in the Italian army and appointed him his  Aide de Camp, employing him in diplomatic missions in France. In 1867 when the Austro-Hungarian Dual Monarchy was established and Hungarian exiles were amnestied, he was at last able to return home. In Hungary, he embarked on a new career as a builder of navigation canals. He was involved in the extension of the Danube-Tisza canal in southern Hungary. In 1876 he accompanied Ferdinand de Lesseps to find a suitable route for the Panama Canal. In the 1880’s he was concerned with the construction of the Corinth Canal through the isthmus connecting the Peloponnese with mainland Greece. From the late 1870’s he played a prominent role in the international peace movement, and presided over the Universal Peace Congress held in Budapest in 1896.

On 10 September 1861, in Mantua, he married Princess Adèle Wyse-Bonaparte (1838-1899), granddaughter of Lucien Bonaparte, a brother of Napoleon I and therefore a cousin of Napoleon III. Both the sitter and his wife were involved in diplomatic activity and extensive correspondence with Prince Napoleon (“Plon-Plon”), who was a close advisor of the Emperor Napoleon III. The couple had a son, Raoul (1838-1899). Türr also had a daughter, Stefania (1885-1940) who was born in Rome and lived most of her life in Italy. She was the first female Italian war correspondent and a prominent feminist, who wrote a book about her father’s role in the Risorgimento.

Towards the end of his life he spent much of his time in Paris. He died in Budapest on 3 May 1908.


PROVENANCE:
Emma and József Földváry

EXHIBITED:
•Nemzeti Szalon, Budapest, 1907, no. 59

LITERATURE:
•Türr, Stefania, L’opera di Stefano Türr nel Risorgimento Italiano 1849-1870 descritta della figlia (The activity of   István Türr in the Italian Risorgimento 1849-1870, described by his daughter), Tipographia Fascista, Firenze, 1928, Vol. I, p. 11, ill.
•Hart-Davis, Duff, in collaboration with Caroline Corbeau-Parsons,  Philip de László. His life and Art, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 2010, pp. 39, 63.

•NSzL149-0010, letter from de László to Lajos Ernst, 21 March 1907
•László, Philip de, 1935 diary, private collection, p. 72, 18 March entry



Pd’O 2017