6747

UNTRACED

CUT DOWN

Sir Rufus Daniel Isaacs, 1st Marquess of Reading, Viceroy of India 1927

Standing full-length and looking to the left, wearing his viceregal robes and the collar Badge of the Star of India, holding documents in his right hand, the base of two columns behind him

Oil on canvas, cut down to approximately 210 x 120 cm (82 ¾ x 47 ¼ in.)

Originally inscribed: de László / 1927

Laib L15053 (877) / C23 (35)  

NPG Album 1925-27, p. 3

Sitters’ Book II, f. 51:  Reading / Decr. 1926

This imposing full-length portrait was painted between the end of December 1926 and the last week of January 1927. It was commissioned for the Viceroy’s House^[1] in Delhi to commemorate the sitter’s appointment in India, when it came to an end in April 1926, and shows Lord Reading in his viceregal robes.^[2] The Marquess of Reading was the third Viceroy de László painted, and the artist saw this commission as the prolongation of a series, as he explained in a letter to the Maharanee of Cooch-Behar [4159]: “Your Highness will be interested to hear just at present I am occupied with painting a life-size portrait of Lord Reading, for the Indian Government in continuation of the two other portraits which I did of Lord Minto and Lord Hardinge.”^[3] 

However, the instructions sent from India were overlooked either by Lord Reading or by de László himself, and the portrait proved too large for its destined place, exceeding by far the required 7 x 4ft. There ensued a seven-month dilemma for Lord Reading, who considered keeping it for his own home, and having another portrait painted for Delhi. On 12 February 1927, he explained to de László: “The difficulty about another portrait is that I shall find it so very difficult to give the sittings as I am so full of engagements. Further India has now seen the pictorial representation of the picture you have painted.^[4] Would it be possible to have another like the first with some variation requiring little in sittings from me.”^[5] De László favoured the idea of a second portrait, but consented to having the portrait cut down to the required size, if necessary. Finally, on 1 September 1927, Lord Reading came to a decision: “I most deeply regret that after trying the picture everywhere I find it impossible to hang it in my house. It is a great disappointment to me & mine. Those for whom the painting was originally commissioned are not unnaturally clamouring for it to be sent to India and I feel bound to give effect to their views.”^[6] On the recommendation of de László, Sydney Kendrick, his favourite copyist, painted a replica of a part of the portrait [111825] for Lord Reading to keep. As soon as the portrait was copied, the original was sent to India having been cut down and re-stretched under the supervision of de László, just in time to be unveiled in Delhi by the Earl of Lytton, Lord Reading’s successor as Viceroy of India. The portrait was probably reduced to a three-quarter length, as suggested in the artist’s correspondence.^[7] However to date it remains untraced, and its fate uncertain.

In January 1928, de László was indeed mysteriously asked to paint another portrait of the Marquess of Reading for the Indian government, which would suggest that the present portrait was already lost or rejected. However, sittings were postponed because of de László’s extensive travels, and the Marquess eventually lost patience. On 19 July 1928, he wrote to the artist: “I am in receipt of your letter of the 13th, regarding the question of your painting a further portrait of me. I am very sorry but as you were away and I was unable to get hold of you for a considerable time, and as it was imperative that the picture should be dispatched to India by a definite date I was obliged to have it painted by another artist, Oswald Birley, and it is now completed.”^[8] The latter portrait^[9] still hangs at the Presidential Palace in New Delhi, but de László’s picture, on the other hand, was not recorded in the Palace’s catalogue published in 1948.  

There exists a preparatory oil study for this formal portrait [6744], and in December 1926, during Lord Reading’s sittings, de László also made a head and shoulders portrait of him wearing evening dress, which he offered to the Marchioness as a New Year’s present [110978].

Rufus Daniel Isaacs was born on 10 October 1860 in London, the second son of Joseph Michael Isaacs (1832-1908), a fruit importer, and his wife Sarah Davis (1835-1922). He was educated in a kindergarten at Gravesend and studied French in Brussels between the age of five and seven. He then became a boarder at the Anglo-Jewish school, Regent’s Park, and in 1873, entered University College School, London, where he showed remarkable ability. However, his father withdrew him after less than a year to prepare him for the family business. Rufus was only thirteen. After spending six months in Hanover to learn German, he started as an apprentice at M. Isaacs & Sons, but his father, in an attempt to discipline him, sent him to work onboard the Blair Athole as a deckhand. He returned in 1877, only to leave almost immediately for Magdeburg, where he was expected to learn more about the import business. His stay came to an end after eight months, when he emptied a tureen of soup over a comrade he had an argument with, and in 1879 he turned his back on the family business to become a jobber in the foreign market at the stock exchange. After much success, he was hit by the 1884 slump, contracting large debts. At that point he turned to law: in January 1885 he was admitted to the Middle Temple and on 17 November 1887, was called to the bar.

On 8 December of the same year, he married Alice Edith Cohen (c. 1866-1930), with whom he had a son, Gerald Rufus (born 1889). Isaacs unconventionally set up in chambers of his own at 1 Garden Court, Temple, and rose steadily, becoming Q.C. in 1898, and Bencher in 1904.  Equalling the likes of Sir Edward Carson [3975], he was one of the first to cross-examine his clients in the witness box. He succeeded Sir Samuel Evans as Solicitor General in March 1910, was knighted, and in October, he succeeded Sir William Robson as Attorney General, an appointment he kept until 1913.

He was actively involved in introducing the government’s legislative programme, notably in the Parliament Act (1911), the National Insurance Act (1911), and the Trade Unions Act (1913). He occupied a seat in the cabinet from 1912 until 1913, and soon became Lloyd George’s [6076] closest friend. However, in 1911, his career nearly came to an end with the ‘Marconi scandal’, during which he was wrongly accused of having used his influence to secure his brother Godfrey a contract to set up wireless stations across the Empire. It was also suggested that he and Lloyd George used inside knowledge to speculate on shares. His name was eventually cleared, partly thanks to Asquith, and he was appointed Lord Chief Justice in October 1913 and raised to the peerage as Baron Reading of Erleigh in 1914. During the First World War Lloyd George called for his help to draft emergency legislation addressing the financial crisis. In 1915, he received the GCB for his services, and the same year he led an Anglo-French Loan Mission to the U.S.A. to seek American credits, securing a loan of £100 million. On his return, he continued to advise the cabinet, and was created Viscount in June 1916. In September 1917, he returned to the United States as High Commissioner, and played a major part in persuading President Wilson that a better military coordination between the U.S.A. and the allies was crucial. He was also appointed to the supreme war council in the quality of financial adviser to the war cabinet. When he returned from America in November he became Earl of Reading. From January 1918 until May 1919, he was appointed Ambassador extraordinary and High Commissioner in Washington, playing a crucial role for the allies. He then resumed – somewhat reluctantly – his duties as Lord Chief Justice, missing the excitement of politics, but in January 1921 he was appointed Viceroy of India. Taking a stand against racial discrimination, he advocated reforms and showed great diplomacy. He notably made a point of visiting Amristar, only two years after the massacre. Despite his progressive views, after much discussion, he ordered Gandhi’s arrest for sedition. His appointment came to an end in 1926, and in April, he was created a Marquess. Again, he had difficulties to adjust to on his return. In 1930, his wife died of cancer. On 6 August 1931, he married Stella Charnaud, his private secretary. The same month, Ramsay MacDonald appointed Reading Secretary of State for Foreign affairs, but he resigned after the general election in October.

He died on 30 December 1935, following an attack of cardiac asthma. His ashes were interred in the Golders Green Jewish cemetery, near the remains of his first wife.

SOURCE: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography

PROVENANCE:          

Government Buildings, New Delhi, India, at the time of the artist’s death (1937)

EXHIBITED:

•The French Gallery, A Series of Portraits and Studies by Philip A. de László, M.V.O., June 1927, no. 22

LITERATURE:          

•DLA 1927 parcel, Scotsman, Edinburgh, 15 January 1927 

•“A Painter of Royalty: The Art of Philip Laszlo,” The Graphic, 18 June 1927, p. 499, ill.

•The New York Times, 25 September 1927, Rotogravure Section, ill.

•Münz, Sigmund, Eduard VII. in Marienbad, Politik und Geselligkeit in den böhmischen Weltbadeorten, Saturn-Verlag, Vienna, 1934, ill. facing p. 176

•The Illustrated London News, 4 January 1936, p. 3, ill.

•Coronation Year, 1936, p. 2, ill.

•“The Art of Our Day: A Paper Read to the Royal Society of Art by Mr. Philip de László” (Reprinted by special permission of the Royal Society of Arts), Apollo, Vol. XXIV, No. 142 (October 1936), p. 242, ill.

•Rutter, Owen, Portrait of a Painter, Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1939, p. 365

•Butler, Iris, The Viceroy’s Wife: Letters of Alice, Countess of Reading from India, 1921-25, Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1969, p. 135, ill. facing p. 49

•DLA063-0004, letter from de László to the Maharanee of Cooch Behar, 14 January 1927

•DLA162-0311, Pesti Hírlap, 19 January 1927 [page unknown], ill.

•DLA083-0023, letter from Lord Reading to de László, 1 September 1927

•DLA083-0022, letter from de László to Lord Reading, 7 September 1927

•DLA083-0005, letter from Lord Reading to de László, 12 September 1927

•DLA083-0041, letter from Lord Reading to de László, 19 July 1928

CC 2008