2701

Study portrait

Colonel Robert Bacon 1910

Head and shoulders to the right, full face, wearing a black jacket, wing collar and dark violet tie

Oil on canvas, 92.1 x 65.1 cm (36 ¼ x 25 ⅝ in.)

Inscribed lower right: P.A. László / Paris. 1910. april. 23. 

Sitters’ Book I, opp. f. 87: Robert Bacon / April 23 1910. / Paris –

Contemporary correspondence between the artist and the sitter’s wife indicates that the present portrait, and that of Mr Elihu Root [110476], were commissioned by the U.S. Department of State.^[1] Sittings were arranged to take place in May 1910 in Paris, where the sitter was United States Ambassador to France.^[2] They were eventually completed in April of that year.

Bacon also commissioned de László to paint his close friend, former President Theodore Roosevelt [5205], who was staying at the Embassy as part of his African and European tour after leaving office. The head and shoulder portrait, the second that de László painted of Roosevelt (the first having been painted in 1908 [5201]), was later donated by the Bacon family to the White House. Lucy de László recorded in December 1911 the receipt of ₤420 from Bacon for the two portraits.^[3]

James Brown Scott [110781] & [111524] recorded in his biography of Bacon that de László travelled to Paris with his friend and patron Colonel Arthur Lee (later Viscount Lee of Fareham) [11019]: “The portrait of Colonel Roosevelt, painted during hurried sittings in the early morning hours, before Paris was up and around, shows him worn and haggard, as he came from the wilds of Africa. Mr. Bacon’s portrait shows the strain of worry and anxiety of those days, but it is Mr. Bacon as his friends and family knew him, and is the one chosen for Harvard University.” Scott also gives an excerpt from a letter de László sent him August 1921, “Never shall I forget the hours I had the pleasure to spend in the late Robert Bacon’s company. It was during the few days when the late president Roosevelt stayed in Paris with him. He [Roosevelt] had just returned from his glorious days in the various countries and Paris was thrilled with Roosevelt. It was then that I painted both the heads of Robert Bacon and, for him, Roosevelt. In the festival atmosphere of the American Embassy I had the sitting of the spontaneous, volcanic Roosevelt, and the distinguished Robert Bacon...I love, as a portrait painter and a man, to think of Robert Bacon. He was the manifestation of a noble gentleman with a great heart and a great soul; beloved by everyone who came into contact with him, the most popular representative of his great country...I am proud to have had the opportunity of painting him and that the replica of my portrait of him will hang on the walls of Harvard University as an example of one of America’s greatest citizens.^[4]”^[5]

Unusually, de László himself painted this replica portrait during his visit to America in 1922 [2700], which remains in the picture collection of Bacon’s alma mater, Harvard University. The artist’s normal practice would be to have one of his trusted copyists complete the work. A second copy, painted by Frederick W. Wright, hangs in the American Embassy in Paris [2702].  De László later painted the sitter’s daughter-in-law, Mrs Elliot Cowdin Bacon [110510] in 1925, and his daughter Martha, Mrs George Whitney [111970] in 1926.

Robert Bacon was born 5 July 1860, at Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, son of William Benjamin Bacon and his wife Emily Crosby Lowe. He was educated at Hopkinson’s School in Boston and at Harvard University, graduating in 1880. In 1881 he joined the banking and brokerage firm of E. Rollins Morse & Brother in Boston, moving to J.P. Morgan & Co., New York, in 1894. He married Martha Waldron Cowdin (1863-1940) in 1884 and they had four children.^[6]

During his career at J. P. Morgan, Bacon was described as, “undoubtedly the perfect example of a Morgan beau ideal. Intellectually brilliant, a star athlete, and breathtakingly handsome…Theodore Roosevelt was one of his classmates at Harvard, and after becoming acquainted with him, wrote home: ‘Bob Bacon is the handsomest man in the Class and as pleasant as he is handsome.’”^[7] He eventually resigned from the firm in 1903 as the result of a nervous breakdown.^[8] He recovered with support from his wife and embarked upon a career in government, with help from his friend President Roosevelt, who secured his appointment as Assistant Secretary of State under Elihu Root. He succeeded Root as Secretary of State, but held the position for only 38 days from January to March 1909. President Taft appointed him U.S. Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to France, a role undertook 1909-1912.

Bacon also served as an elected Overseer of Harvard College in 1889, 1895, and 1902, and was a Fellow from 1912-1917. In 1917 he was commissioned as a major in the Quartermaster Corps of the U.S. Army, and sailed for France with General Pershing [6887]. He remained in Europe until 1919, but his health was severely undermined. He died 29 May 1919 of blood poisoning resulting from surgery for mastoiditis.

PROVENANCE:

By descent in the family

EXHIBITED:

•The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, Paintings by Philip A. de László, 26 February-20 March, 1921, no. 23

•M. Knoedler and Co., New York. Paintings by Philip A. de László, 4-16 April 1921, no. 17

LITERATURE:

•Scott, James Brown, Robert Bacon: Life and Letters, 1923, pp. 146-147

•Hart-Davis, Duff, in collaboration with Caroline Corbeau-Parsons, De László: His Life and Art, Yale University Press, 2010, p. 124

•Field, Katherine ed., Transcribed by Susan de Laszlo, The Diaries of Lucy de László Volume I: (1890-1913), de Laszlo Archive Trust, 2019, p. 204

•DLA121-0033, letter from de László to Mrs. Robert Bacon, 12 August 1909

•László, Lucy de, 1911 diary, private collection, 12 December 1911 entry, p. 190

MD 2013