4825

Madame Jenő Hubay de Szalatnya, née Countess Róza Cebrián^[1] 1896
Half-length, slightly to the left, head turned and looking full face to the viewer; wearing a high-necked green, embroidered organza gown trimmed with a decorative pale blue satin collar, a brooch set with cabochon emeralds and pearls, cabochon emerald earrings, and a ferronnière, consisting of a string of pearls, in her auburn hair, with an emerald clasp holding an emerald pendant over her forehead
Oil on canvas, 73 x 54 cm (27 ½ x 19 ¾ in.)
Inscribed lower right: László Fülöp / 1896 / II [red paint]

Inscribed upper left: RÓZA

Sitters' Book I, f. 17: Hubay Jenőné^[2]

Private Collection

This portrait was painted in the artist's new studio in the Bálvány utca, which he acquired in 1895 after his return to Budapest from Munich.^[3] The portrait was first exhibited at the Venice Biennale in 1897. In his monograph on de László written in 1913, von Schleinitz remarked that this venue was an appropriate choice, as the colours were reminiscent of Venetian painters and the portrait was in the “Venetian style”.^[4] The artist depicted Mme. de Hubay wearing a ferronnière, a style fashionable during the Italian renaissance, consisting of a band worn around the forehead with a jewel in the centre, named after "La Belle Ferronnière", a portrait in the Louvre generally accepted as by Leonardo da Vinci. The green emeralds in the present picture serve to form a striking colour contrast with the sitter’s Titian hair.

The artist recorded in his diary that her husband, the world-famous violinist Jenő Hubay, played in the studio during the sittings.^[5] De László’s good friend, the historian Gábor Térey,^[6] wrote about this portrait: “The painter attempted to capture the effect of the music on the face of his sitter.... There is certainly something in her expression that is so far removed from the everyday and the ordinary; she seems to be immersed in some higher pleasure. De László is like Lenbach^[7] here: the strength of the expression is focused in the eyes, these wide open, brown, almost dreamy eyes which are in curious contrast to the flaming red hair decorated with pearls and emeralds."^[8]

In 1898, the portrait was exhibited at the fashionable Schulte Gallery in Berlin. According to Rutter, “All the critics were unanimous in their praise of ... the striking picture of Mme. Eugene Hubay, the auburn haired wife of the famous Hungarian violinist. The German critics accepted him, in fact, no longer as a promising young artist, but as a fully-fledged painter with a great career before him”.^[9] After the exhibition the artist presented the portrait to Hubay, who wrote in a letter of thanks: “It was a delightful surprise for me when they brought my wife's portrait today. I assure you once more that you have indebted me immensely by your generous act of friendship in making me a present of this masterpiece. Please accept our sincerest thanks. You have caused us both quite extraordinary pleasure. I am asking you to allow me to present you with that old German sideboard which stands in my hall and which, I know, you always admired, as a poor token of our gratitude. I have asked your mother to find a place for it somewhere in your house”.^[10]   

De László first met the sitter and her husband in the salon of his friend, Emma Földváry^[11] in late 1895 or early 1896. A life-long friendship developed between the Hubays and the de Lászlós. They had many interests in common, not least that de László's wife Lucy Guinness was a gifted amateur violinist. Prior to the First World War de László invited Hubay to London to paint his portrait,^[12] however, the visit and the painting of the portrait never took place. Their correspondence was interrupted by the war but was resumed in 1935, when the Hubays encouraged the de Lászlós to buy a country house in Hungary. Róza offered to search for a suitable estate, or to lease one of her two country houses near Losoncz.^[13] De László replied to her with regret: "It would have been just glorious to be with you, to enjoy our old friendship, and the genuine artistic atmosphere of your milieu - an atmosphere which is fast vanishing, and which one finds only seldom now... it would have been so lovely to paint there to my heart's desire."^[14] Alas, de László had recently suffered a serious heart attack and was unable to pursue the idea.

The two couples last met in March 1935 when de László was in Budapest to paint Admiral Horthy, the Regent of Hungary [110886]. The Hubays gave a dinner party in honour of the artist and his wife, and afterwards de László recorded in his diary, “Hubay hardly looks his 70 years - full of vigour - enthusiasme - alas Roza Countess Cebrian - his wife - has much changed - her lovely red hair became - white ... but her devotion love to him the same - her velvety eyes warm - deep - loyal - The same. I was enchanted to see my portrait of her I painted 40 years ago.”^[15] Two days later the Hubays invited the artist and his wife to join them at the Opera in their box where, sitting next to the Regent, they saw Hubay's opera, 'The Venus of Milo'. De László noted in his diary:  “The opera was perfectly staged ... well played very artistic - but the musik reminded me to[o] much of Wagner & Strauss & is lacking of a great - & motive of individual beauty & character - He was a great master  - to his pupil - a hard worker - fine man -  but he never was a great artist!”.^[16] De László's opinion shows that he was a perceptive critic; his view was very much in keeping with the verdict of posterity, that Hubay was a great violinist and a great teacher, but not a great original composer.

Countess Róza Cebrián was born in Budapest on 6 July 1870, the youngest daughter of Count László Cebrián (1823-1900), of the Cebrian-Figuerollas family and his wife Róza, née Baroness Révay de Szklabina et Blatnicza (1830-1889).^[17] The sixteen year old Róza met her future husband Jenő Hubay in 1886, the year Hubay returned from Brussels to Budapest to take up the post of head of the violin school at the Academy of Music, a post which had previously been held by his father. Hubay, a pupil of Joseph Joachim in Berlin, was twelve years older than Róza and had already had a distinguished career as a violinist and teacher in Paris, London and Brussels.^[18] Róza was an avid concert-goer and a good singer and pianist. She played chamber music with Hubay and practised playing sonatas by Beethoven and Grieg under his supervision. She wrote fine lyric poetry (in German) which was set to music by Hubay and others, including the young Franz Lehár, as Lieder.^[19] The writer and diarist Zsigmond Justh met the nineteen year old Róza at a dinner around this time, and gives a description of her: "I sat next to Róza Cebrián...  She is an interesting girl, one of the most interesting in Pest. A Rubens-figure, but with much more temperament than Rubens's women seem to have had... Artistic, in the way people were artistic during the renaissance - very sensuous -  through listening to music she is capable of falling in love with somebody she has never actually seen".^[20]

Róza and Hubay fell in love, but her parents withheld their consent to the marriage, which they considered socially unsuitable. Róza nevertheless married him at the very first opportunity that the law allowed her to do so - on her 24th birthday, on 6th July 1894. Hubay, who had 'hungarianised' his name in the late 1870's from Huber, was ennobled in 1907, taking the title Hubay de Szalatnya. After their marriage, Hubay, while continuing to teach at the Academy of Music and giving concerts abroad, devoted more time to composing. Róza dedicated her life to her husband and his music. The couple had three sons. László (born in 1895), died in infancy; the two surviving brothers, Andor (born 1898)^[21] and Tibor (whose date of birth is unknown) took the family name of Hubay-Cebrián, as the Cebrián family became extinct with the death of Róza's brother in 1901. They built a magnificent house, the Palais Hubay on the Buda side of the Danube quay, completed in 1898. The music room on the first floor could accommodate 150 guests and was furnished with their art collection and a white Bösendorfer piano. Here they gave concerts of chamber music and received Budapest's musical, artistic and fashionable society, often entertaining distinguished visiting artists.^[22] 

During the brief communist regime in 1919 the Hubay family fled to Switzerland. After the collapse of the regime Hubay was recalled by the new government and in November 1919 he was appointed Director of the Academy of Music. He remained in this post until his retirement in 1934, but after this continued his teaching activity at the violin school^[23] until his sudden death in 1937. After their return from exile Róza resumed her salon in 1920 and held musical afternoons on Sundays at the Palais Hubay, with concerts featuring the most promising young musicians of the day. From 1928 the concerts were broadcast, often internationally. After her husband's death, Róza resumed the musical afternoons in 1939. The last concert was given in the autumn of 1944, by which time the Russian army was approaching Budapest. Róza, who was seriously ill, took refuge on her country estate near Losoncz, and died there, surrounded by her family, on 30 November 1944. The Palais Hubay suffered severe bomb damage during the siege of Buda in February 1945, but was restored in 2008, and the music room is again being used for concerts.

There exists a colour reproduction of the present portrait by the firm of E. A. Seemann of Leipzig^[24] [9155], in the collection of a descendant of the sitter .

EXHIBITED:
•Venice, II Espozizione d'arte di Venezia, 1897, no. 13, p. 196
•Berlin, Schulte Gallery, February 1898
•Budapest, Műcsarnok, Tavaszi Nemzetközi Kiállítás [Spring International Exhibition], 1898, no. 181, pp. 17-18, ill.
•Berlin, Grosse Berliner Kunstausstellung, 1910, no. 1492
•Rome, Esposizione Internazionale di Belle Arti (Hungarian Section), 1911, no. 119

•Műcsarnok, Budapest, Hungarian Fine Art Society Spring Exhibition and Retrospectives of Philip de László, Mihály Munkácsy, János Pentelei Molnár, Samu Petz and László Hűvös, 4 May - 30 June 1925 [Műcsarnok, Országos Magyar Képzőművészeti Társulat, Budapest, Tavaszi kiállítás és László Fülöp, Munkácsy Mihály, Pentelei Molnár János, valamit Petz Samu és Hűvös László összegyűjtött műveinek kiállítása, 1925. május 4 - június 30.], no. 31
•Budapest, Nemzeti Szalon, 5 - 20 October 1935, no. 73

LITERATURE:

•Berliner Tageblatt, Berlin, 22 February 1898

•Egy magyar művész sikerei Berlinben [The success of a Hungarian artist in Berlin], Budapesti Napló, Budapest, 8 March 1898

•Az Országos Magyar Képzőművészeti Társulat 1898 évi nemzetközi kiállítására [For the 1898 Spring International Exhibition of the Hungarian Society of Fine Arts], Franklin -Társulat Könyvnyomdája, [Printed by the Franklin Society], Budapest, 1898, p. 17, ill.
•L'Art et la Couleur, Des Maîtres Contemporains,  1904, no. 8
•Schleinitz, Otto (von), Künstler Monographien  nº 106, Ph. A. von László, Velhagen & Klasing,  Bielefeld und Leipzig,  1913, pp. 31-2
•Rutter, Owen, Portrait of a Painter, London, 1939, pp. 158, 159, 179, 220
•Petrovics, Elek, Magyar mesterművek [Hungarian Masterpieces], Budapest, 1936, p. 51, ill. full plate, and p.110, no. 51, ill. with text
•Hart-Davis, Duff, in collaboration with Caroline Corbeau -Parsons, Philip de László:  His Life and Art, Yale University Press, 2010, p. 39, ill. pl. 18

•Hart-Davis, Duff, László Fülöp élete és festészete [Philip de László's Life and Painting], Corvina, Budapest, 2019, ill. 23, p. 285

•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. 25

•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. 25, ill.

•DLA162-0218, Pesti Hírlap, 14 April 1898, p. 3

•DLA140-0043, Zeitschrift für Bildende Kunst, 1910, Neue Folge XXI, Heft 12, ill.

•DLA162-0022, Pesti Hírlap, 1 May 1910, p. 8

•DLA066-0029, letter from Jenő Hubay to de László, 14 January 1913
•DLA066-0037, letter from Jenő Hubay to de László, 13 February 1913
•DLA066-0034, letter from Jenő Hubay to de László, 16 June 1913

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

•DLA162-0441, Pesti Hírlap, 26 May 1934, p. 3

•László, Philip de, 1935 diary, private collection, 15 March entry, pp. 69-70

•DLA162-0085, Kézdi-Kovács, László, “Arcképfestészet. Reprezentatív kiállítás a Nemzeti Szalonban” [Portrait Painting. Representative Exhibition at the National Salon], Pesti Hírlap, 5 October 1935, p. 8

•László, Lucy de, 1935 diary, private collection

•DLA091-0287, Article by Gábor Térey, László Fülöp. Női arckép [Philip de László, Portrait of a Lady], [original source and date unknown]

Pd’O 2012