10672

Genre picture

Falling Leaves 1895

An elderly soldier, seated full-length on a bench in a park, surrounded by autumnal trees shedding their leaves; wearing his military cap and cape over dark dress uniform, leaning his right arm on the table beside him, his left hand draped over a stick that rests between his knees

Oil on panel, 64 x 80 cm (25 x 31 ½ in.)

Inscribed lower left: LÁSZLÓ F. / 1895

Private Collection

In his memoirs de László writes of this painting: “It depicted an old pensioner of ’48 sitting on a bench in a wood, with his thoughts far away in the past and the yellow autumn leaves falling round him. I had many such subjects in mind; they gave me pleasure to paint and […] I should have liked to have done more of that type of picture, but the need of money and my ardent desire to help my people compelled me to paint various portraits for 400 or 500 Florins, a sum which meant much to me in those days!”^[1] The old soldier is a veteran of the 1848-49 War of Independence against the Habsburgs.

Falling Leaves was painted the year before Hungary commemorated the one thousandth anniversary of the occupation and settlement of the Carpathian Basin by the Magyars in 1896. The festivities gave rise to a wave of national sentiment and the theme of the picture may be seen as a nostalgic and proud reminder of Hungary’s struggle for independence.

The inspiration for the painting comes from “Mindvégig” (“To the Very End”), the first poem of an elegiac, melancholy cycle of lyric poems entitled “Őszikék” (“Autumn Crocuses”, 1877) by János Arany (1817-1882), the great epic poet and translator of Shakespeare. A literal translation reads: “Why, this life is beautiful / Until its end, if you are careful / With what’s left of it; / But when Autumn comes / And your leaves have fallen / Do not yearn for Summer.” Incidentally, de László was commissioned to paint the poet’s daughter-in-law, Mrs Ladislaus Arany [111013], in February 1894.^[2]

Schleinitz mistakenly attributed the painting to 1892 and described it as “full of gloomy, backward looking and no doubt allegorically meant autumnal mood. The picture was painted in a park in Budapest.^[3] […] Here in our painting we see an old soldier, a Honvéd (literally ‘Defender of the Fatherland’) veteran from 1848, over whose home no doubt the well known dedication to invalids might have been written: ‘Laeso sed invicto militi’ (‘To the wounded but unconquered soldier’). Contemplating the falling leaves, he feels that his hour too has come to enlist in the Great Army of the Eternal Host. Immersed in the memory of a year (1848) that was so eventful and meaningful for Hungary and brooding over changing times, in this autumnal picture the man conveys to us in the most concise way his story, told without words.”^[4]

De László was clearly proud of this painting as he took a reproduction of it with him when he first met his future mother-in-law in London in 1898.  He must have created a good impression on Mrs Guinness whose verdict was, “A most fascinating but dangerous man.”^[5] 

This reproduction is to be seen in a photograph of the artist in his London studio in 1911, after he moved from Vienna in 1907. While he lived at 3 Palace Gate (1908-1921), he rented a studio in West House, Campden Hill Road from the widow of George Henry Boughton, R.A. (1833-1905). The other significant pictures included (some in reproduction) are: Pope Leo XIII [6027], the Artist’s Mother, [11634], Fürstin Lily Kinsky [10972], Crown Princess Cecilie [4489], Ernst Ludwig, Grand Duke of Hesse and the Rhine [5941], German Emperor Wilhelm II [4789], Eva Guinness [5440] and Princess Leopold von Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen [8497].

There are a number of preparatory works for the lone soldier in Falling Leaves: two oils [111359] [111908], and two pastels on cardboard [12950] [13571], all of which remain in private collections. A fifth, graphite on paper [6955], belongs to the Department of Prints and Drawings, Hungarian National Gallery in Budapest.

There are two further preparatory works, Memories of the Past [12873] an oil study with two elderly soldiers , and a sketch, Three Soldiers in a Wood [8996], now in the collection of the Department of Prints and Drawings, Hungarian National Gallery, Budapest, where de László’s composition combines those of the preparatory drawing for the Memories of the Past with one for the lone figure in Falling Leaves.

PROVENANCE:

Dr Pál Majovszky^[6] purchased for 500 florins at the Millennium Exhibition 1896;^[7] 

Samu Mándy de Kántorjános,^[8] exhibited from his collection at the Műcsarnok 1925;

Sold at BÁV, Budapest, 23 December 1970

EXHIBITED:         

•Műcsarnok, Hungarian Society of Fine Arts, Budapest, Téli kiállítás [Winter Exhibition], 1895, no. 69

•Műcsarnok, Budapest, Millenniumi kiállítás [Millennium Exhibition], 1896, no. 720 (listed for 800 florins)

•Nemzeti Szalon, Budapest, 1907, no. 72 (in the property of Dr Pál Majovszky)

•Műcsarnok, Hungarian Fine Art Society, Budapest, Tavaszi kiállítás és László Fülöp, Munkácsy Mihály, Pentelei Molnár János, valamit Petz Samu és Hűvös László összegyűjtött műveinek kiállítása [Spring Exhibition and Retrospectives of Philip de László, Mihály Munkácsy, János Pentelei Molnár, Samu Petz and László Hűvös], 4 May – 30 June 1925, no. 8 (in the property of Samu Mándy)

•Palacio Arte Moderno, Biblioteca Nacional, May 1927 (to be confirmed)

•Christie’s, King Street, London, A Brush with Grandeur, 6-22  January 2004, no. 14

•Budapest, Hungarian National Museum, Vonzások és Változások. 18-19 századi magyar festészet magángyűjteményekben [Affinities and Transformations. 18th and 19th century Hungarian paintings in private collections], 23 March – 25 August 2013

LITERATURE:        

•“László Fülöp a Vatikánban” [Philip de László in the Vatican], Új Idők, vol. 7, no. 9, 24 February 1901, p. 194, ill.

•Schleinitz, Otto von, Künstler Monographien Ph A. v. László, Bielefed and Leipzig (Velhagen & Klasing), 1913, pp 22-3, ill. p. 17, pl. 19

•Rutter, Owen, Portrait of a Painter, 1939, p. 151, 153, 163
•Clifford, Derek, The Paintings of P.A. de Laszlo, 1969, p. 23, monochrome ill. pl. 11

•De Laszlo, Sandra, ed., & Christopher Wentworth-Stanley, asst. ed., A Brush with Grandeur, Paul Holberton Publishing, London 2004, pp. 76-77, ill. p. 77

•Hart-Davis, Duff, in collaboration with Caroline Corbeau-Parsons, De László: His Life and Art, Yale University Press, 2010, p. 45

•Barber, Annabel, Tales from the Dual Monarchy, Somerset Books, 2025, front cover, ill.

•NSzL150-0024, letter from de László to Elek Lippich, 23 September 1895

•DLA140-0016, Új Idők, vol. I, no. 51, Budapest, 8 December 1895, ill. p. 16

•DLA029-0154, letter from Elek Lippich to de László, 1 October 1896

•DLA029-0147, letter from Elek Lippich to de László, 14 October 1896

•DLA029-0152, letter from Elek Lippich to de László, 18 October 1896

•DLA162-0459, Kézdi-Kovács, László, “Téli műtárlat” [Winter Exhibition], Pesti Hírlap, 27 November 1895, p. 1

•DLA090-0090, Salgó, Ernő, “A téli műtárlat” [Winter Exhibition], Egyetértés [date and page unknown]        

•DLA140-0098, Lázár, Béla, “László Fülöp”, Vasárnapi Újság, vol. 48, issue 28, Budapest: Franklin-Társulat, 14 July 1901, p. 488, ill.

•DLA140-0132, Moderne Kunst, vol. XVII, issue 20, Berlin, Leipzig, Wien, Stuttgart, 1903, p. 256, ill.

•NSzL149-0010, letter from de László to Ernst, 21 March 1907

•DLA140-0176, Dr. Erdey, Aladár, “László Fülöp festményeinek gyűjteményes kiállítása” [Exhibition of Paintings by Philip de László], Vasárnapi Újság, issue 15, 14 April 1907, Budapest p. 295

•DLA140-0215, Új Idők, p. 194, ill. [1908]

•DLA162-0270, Pesti Hírlap, 16 May 1925, p. 5

CWS & Pd’O 2008

BS 2021