110798

Monsignor Zsigmond Bubics, Bishop of Kassa 1896
Seated, half-length to the left, head turned and looking full face to the viewer holding a bible or prayer book on his lap, wearing clerical robes and a gold pectoral cross on a gold chain
Oil on canvas, 95 x 69.5 cm (37 ⅜ x 27 ⅜ in.)
Inscribed lower right: PH. LÁSZLÓ / PINXIT. / 1896.
The sitter's coat of arms upper left: The shield divided per pale, a mitre, a cross and a crosier behind it, ensigned with a green hat from which hangs a green cord on each side with six green tassels. Dexter: blue field with three white roses. Sinister: red field with St Andrew in a green cloak

Sitters' Book I, f. 10: Sigismundus Bubics / Episcopus [on a page with one other date inscription 1899]
Sitters' Book I, f. 13: Bubics Zsigmond [on a page inscribed in the artist's hand: Budapest, 1899 / május 8, and apparently signed at the same time by the sitter and four others]: Gr. Szapáry Gyula / Fraknói Vilmos / Lippich Elek / Hajnal Márton^[1] 

Arcibiskupksý úrad, Košice [Archbishop's Palace, Košice, Slovakia]

In preparation for the Millennial celebrations in 1896^[2], de László was commissioned by the Hungarian Government to travel to Dresden to copy the 1712 portrait of Ferenc Rákóczi II, Prince of Transylvania by Ádám Mányoki [6724].^[3] He planned to paint another portrait of Prince Rákóczi in Rodostó [112621] while exiled on the shores of Sea of Marmara but this was never completed. Bubics was involved in the art committee for the celebrations and involved with writing the catalogue. He may have met de László at this time or was later introduced by their mutual friend and the artist's mentor Monsignor Vilmos Fraknói [5120].

Although the artist was nearly fifty years younger than the elderly Bishop, they had many interests in common and a friendship developed. The Bishop was a renowned art collector, an art historian and amateur painter. He was no doubt a more congenial sitter than many members of the aristocracy who were already commissioning portraits from the young artist. When de László was staying at the Bishop's residence in Kassa, he compared the atmosphere there to his experience at the country estate where he had just spent some weeks painting members of an aristocratic family: “After all the dull and insincere evenings, I am happy because of the true affection [the Bishop] shows towards me, which comes from the heart.”^[4] He was also fascinated by the Bishop's appearance and his clerical vestments. He planned to paint another portrait of him: “In Munich I bought a beautiful "della Robia” [sic] frame, and when I will be in Budapest I shall paint the Bishop in a similar style, in real antique vestments, with an Insula^[5] on his head ... I shall paint this for Venice ... Eventually I shall offer it to the Historical Gallery.”^[6] The Hungarian newspaper Pesti Hírlap reported that de László was painting three portraits of Bubics for the Historical Gallery, the Archbishop’s Palace and the Bishop’s private gallery,^[7] however, the picture for the Historical Gallery was never realized.

The present picture was intended as an official portrait for the Archbishop's Palace in Kassa, where it still hangs alongside those of all serving bishops from 1804 to 1928. It was exhibited in Munich, Frankfurt, Vienna and Budapest and then sent to Bishop Bubics in Kassa.^[8] From there Bubics wrote to the artist: “My picture arrived safely from Budapest yesterday. I shall of course return with thanks the frame which you need.”^[9] The canvas was cut down on the left and at the bottom to fit a new ornate gilt frame similar to those of the other portraits at the palace.^[10] A plaque attached to the bottom of the frame is inscribed “Sigismundus Bubics / ab anno 1887-1907,” the dates during which the sitter was Bishop of Kassa.

Bishop Bubics was seventy-five when this portrait was painted, but the twenty-seven year old artist formed an immediate rapport with him. They had much in common, as Bubics was an eminent art historian, connoisseur, collector of old masters, and an amateur painter of landscape, still life and flower paintings.^[11] When de László visited the Bishop at his episcopal palace in Kassa in January 1897, he wrote about Bubics with great warmth and affection: “I am happy because of the true affection that he shows towards me, which comes from the heart. I am already looking forward to tomorrow morning, when I will go to his beautiful chapel where he himself will be saying mass.”^[12] One may surmise that the Bishop was a father figure to de László, who had experienced little affection from his own.

His friendship with the Bishop had a significant effect on de László's subsequent career. He was introduced to important aristocratic families of Northern Hungary. In 1896 he made the acquaintance of Count Ernő Zichy [110805], a major landowner in Buzinka, near Kassa, who was an amateur painter and renowned collector of porcelain.^[13] In the same year he met Count József Mailáth, who visited the Bishop when de László was painting his portrait, thought to be the present picture. The Count was very impressed and, on the suggestion of Bubics, he invited the artist to stay at his estate in Perbenyik (near Kassa) to paint him and members of his family. The artist spent some months there in late 1896 and early 1897 and painted several members of the Mailáth family.^[14]

Zsigmond Bubics was born 11 March 1821 in Ozara, in the county of Tolna, one of six children of Mihály Bubics, estate factor to Prince Pál Antal Esterházy, and Mihály’s wife Anna, née Thanhoffer. The family were of Croatian origin. He studied theology in Győr and Vienna and was ordained a priest in 1844. In 1848 he became tutor to Prince Pál Antal's grandchildren. He remained with the Esterházy family for nearly twelve years, travelling with them to England, Germany and Italy. In 1880 he was appointed Canon of Nagyvárad and Head of the Seminary there.^[15] Elected to Parliament in 1884, he was appointed Bishop of Kassa in 1887.^[16] He became a corresponding member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in 1893 and an honorary member in 1900.

Bishop Bubics is best remembered as a patron of the arts, an art historian and a collector. While working for the Esterházy family he was instrumental in transferring their art collection from Vienna to Budapest, where it formed the nucleus of the future Museum of Fine Arts. He catalogued the engravings of the Hungarian National Museum (1880) and published books on mediaeval miniatures (1883) and on miniature painting (1899). He donated his collection of paintings, including his portrait by de László [2908], to the Museum of Kassa, and his important collection of ceramics to the Museum of Applied Arts in Budapest.^[17] Some of his own paintings (landscapes and still-life paintings) are in the Museum of Kassa and in the Hungarian National Gallery.

In his last years Bishop Bubics developed senile dementia. He was exploited and defrauded, and his lay secretary (who was also suspected of writing his pastoral letters) was imprisoned for fraud.^[18] The resulting scandal led to the appointment of a coadjutor (assistant bishop) to administer the See. Bubics retired to a sanatorium in Baden in 1904, and died there on 22 May 1907.

De László painted another portrait of the Bishop [2908], probably in 1896, in which he is shown in a very similar pose. That portrait was intended for the Bishop's private collection and was later donated by him to the museum of Kassa.^[19] There exists a portrait drawing [2910] which is identical in composition to this second portrait, and also a study portrait [2913], which are both dated 1896.

PROVENANCE:
Presented by the sitter to Arcibiskupský úrad [Archbishop's Palace], Košice, Slovakia

EXHIBITED:
•Kunstverein, Munich, 1896
•Galerie Schneider, Frankfurt, winter 1896-97
•Spring Exhibition, Stuttgart, 1897
•Hungarian Fine Art Society, Tavaszi kiállítás [Spring Exhibition], Budapest, 1897, no. 39

•Künstlerhaus, Vienna, XXV. Jahres-Ausstellung [25th Annual Exhibition], March 1897, no. 185, ill. p. 116

LITERATURE:
•Künstlerhaus, Vienna, XXV. Jahres-Ausstellung [25th Annual Exhibition], Wien, Verlag der Genossenschaft der Bildenden Künstler Wiens, 24 March 1897, p. 116, ill.
•Szokolszky, Bertalan, A százéves kassai püspökség 1804 -1904, Kassa, 1904, ill. facing p.135
•Ady, Endre, Bubics Zsigmond esete [The case of Zsigmond Bubics], Budapesti Napló, 30 March 1906
•Schleinitz,O von, Ph. A. von László. Künstler -Monographien No. 106,Velhagen & Klasing, Bielegeld und Leipzig, 1913, p. 35
•Mailáth, Count József, László Fülöp, In Budapesti Hírlap, 13 November 1927
•Rutter, Owen, Portrait of a Painter, Hodder and Stoughton, London, 1939, p. 152
•I. Vaško, ed., Dóm sv. Alžbety v Košiciach, Košice, 2000. Published in English as The Cathedral of St. Elizabeth in Košice, Košice, 2000, p.37, ill. fig. 61
•Buzinkay, Péter, “Főpapi műgyűjtőink a modern kor hajnalán (1895-1924). Bubics Zsigmond kassai püspök műgyűjteménye” [Our prelates as art collectors at the dawn of the modern age (1895-1924). The art collection of Zsigmond Bubics, Bishop of Kassa], Magyar egyháztörténeti vázlatok [Essays in Hungarian Church History], M.E.T.E.M., Pannonhalma - Budapest, 2008, pp. 44-46, ill. p. 60
•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. 45, 46

•Field, Katherine ed., Transcribed by Susan de Laszlo, The Diaries of Lucy de László Volume I: (1890-1913), de Laszlo Archive Trust, 2019, p. 49

•Field, Katherine ed., Gábor Bellák and Beáta Somfalvi, Philip de László (1869-1937); "I am an Artist of the World", Magyar Nemzeti Galéria, 2019, p. 17

•DLA162-0350, Pesti Hírlap, 21 March 1896, p. 7

•DLA162-0436, Pesti Hírlap, 26 June 1896, p. 7

•NSzL150-0037, letter from de László to Elek Lippich, 22 October 1896

•NSzL150-0038, letter from de László to Elek Lippich, 28 October 1896
•NSzL150-0043, letter from de László to Elek Lippich, 31 December 1896
•NSzL150-0044, letter from de László to Elek Lippich, 8 January 1897

•DLA162-0159, Pesti Hírlap, 5 May 1897, p. 1

•DLA066-0043, letter from Zsigmond Bubics to de László, 4 July [year unknown, presumably 1897]

We are grateful to Peter Jenčik, Ján Urban and Professor Peter Zubko of the Archbishop's Palace, Košice, for their help.



Pd'O 2014