8014

The Infante don Gonzalo de Borbón y Battenberg; son of Alfonso XIII 1927

Standing three-quarter length to the right, in the blue and red dress uniform of an Infantry soldier, with a blue cape around his shoulders and his left hand holding the hilt of his sword; he wears the Town Councils’ Medal of Homage to the King and Queen

Oil on canvas, 90.2 x 63.5 cm (35 ½ x 25 in.)

Inscribed top right:  S.A. EL INFANTE D. GONZALO 

Sitters’ Book II, f. 53: Gonzalo / 13-IV-1927 / Madrid.- Palacio Real.

Patrimonio Nacional, Madrid

This portrait was painted during de László’s second visit to Spain, in 1927, when he painted the entire Spanish royal family. It is very close in composition to the portrait of his elder brother don Juan [12015], but a letter from Lucy de László to her son Paul, written on 24 March 1927, reveals that de László originally had a very different conception in mind: “Dads was so excited yesterday. It is suggested that the youngest son (9) shd be painted in the same armour that Velasquez painted Don Carlos on horseback.^[1]  Well, they sent to the Armouria & brought the very armour & sash & helmet; as Dads said greatly moved to me afterwards, to think that Velasquez touched & painted the very same things.”^[2] In her next letter to Paul, on 7 April 1927, she explained why de László’s project did not come to fruition: “After all Dads is not painting the Don Carlos suit of armour, the King objected, he wants his own time painted.”^[3] 

The present portrait is not signed, which is extremely rare for such an important work. It is possible that the artist intended to return to it and add a few finishing touches and then sign it but forgot to do so.

The Infante don Gonzalo, the fourth and youngest son of Alfonso XIII of Spain and Princess Victoria Eugénie of Battenberg, was born at the Palacio Real in Madrid on 24 October 1914. He suffered from haemophilia, but less seriously than his eldest brother, don Alfonso [8004]. He was a brilliant student and the favourite companion of his brother, don Juan, which may explain why their portraits were apparently conceived as a pair.

He was only sixteen when he accompanied his mother and brothers and sisters into exile in 1931.  By 1934, he was studying engineering at the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium, rather than at the University of Madrid, as had been originally planned. King Alfonso had chosen to spend the summer of 1934 in Austria and had rented a house in Pörtschach in the Austrian Tyrol, near the Klagenfurt Lake with his sons Jaime, Juan and Gonzalo and his two daughters. During that holiday, don Gonzalo and doña Beatriz had a serious car accident.  She was driving and had to swerve to avoid an oncoming bicycle, crashing into the wall of Krumpendorf Castle. Neither of them appeared to have suffered serious injury, but even minor bruising caused don Gonzalo to suffer severe abdominal bleeding.  King Alfonso sent urgently for Queen Victoria Eugenia, who immediately set out for Austria, but don Gonzalo died on 13 August 1934, before she arrived.  He was nineteen years old. The whole family accompanied his body to be buried under a simple cross in the cemetery of Pörtschach. His remains were entombed at El Escorial, 45 kilometres northwest of the capital, Madrid, in 1985, on the same day as the re-entombment of his mother, Queen Victoria Eugenia and of his brothers, don Alfonso and don Jaime.

PROVENANCE:

Property of Alfonso XIII, inv. no. 1306, hung in the King's study in the Royal Palace

EXHIBITED:

•Museo de Arte Moderno, Madrid, 12-16 May 1927 ^[4]

•The French Gallery, London, A Series of Portraits and Studies by Philip A. de László, M.V.O., June 1927, no. 3

LITERATURE:  

•Letter from Lucy de László to Paul de Laszlo, 7 April 1927

•Rutter, Owen, Portrait of a Painter, 1939 p. 369

•Alcón, María Teresa Ruiz. “Habitaciones y Objetos Personales del Rey Don Alfonso XIII”, in Reales Sitios, no. 63, 1980, pp. 25-28, ill. p. 25, no. 4

•Hart-Davis, Duff, in collaboration with Caroline Corbeau-Parsons, De László: His Life and Art, Yale University Press, 2010, p. 207

•García-Frías Checa, Carmen, ed., El Retrato en Las Colecciones Reales de Patrimonio Nacional de Juan de Flandes a Antonio López, 2015, pp. 466-469, ill. p. 472

•DLA123-0019, letter from Lucy de László to Paul de Laszlo, 24 March 1927

•DLA123-0020, letter from Lucy de László to Paul and John de Laszlo, 7 April 1927

With our grateful thanks to Excmo. Sr. Don Javier González de Vega y San Román for his assistance in preparing the biography for this entry.

SMdeL 2014