Wertheimer portraits
|
| Asher Wertheimer |
|---|
| John Singer Sargent , 1898 |
| Oil on canvas |
| Tate Britain, London |
The portraits of the Wertheimer family were created by the American portraitist John Singer Sargent from 1898. In total, a series of twelve images was created.
Wertheimer family
Asher Wertheimer (1844-1918) was a London art dealer with his headquarters on Bond Street. The Jewish Wertheimer family originally came from Germany; Samson Wertheimer was one of Asher Wertheimer's ancestors . Asher Wertheimer was trained in London and Paris. His father was an art dealer, as was his brother, with whom he competed after his father's death. Asher Wertheimer's wife Flora was the daughter of a colleague. The couple had a total of 12 children. The family had a close friendship with the painter John Singer Sargent; the artist made regular visits to the family residence at 8 Connaught Place in London. Eight of the twelve portraits he painted of family members initially hung in the dining room of the house.
The portrait series
The art dealer ordered the first two pictures - portraits of Asher Wertheimer himself and of Flora Wertheimer - from Sargent on the occasion of his silver wedding anniversary in 1898. The portrayal of the art dealer was received enthusiastically by critics; Robert Ross drew a comparison in the Art Journal with the portrait of Pope Innocent X von Velázquez . Flora Wertheimer's portrait, on the other hand, met with less approval. Although it initially remained in the family's possession, Sargent was soon commissioned to make another portrait of the art dealer's wife. In the course of the next ten years, Wertheimer received numerous other orders, so that Sargent finally claimed to suffer from chronic Wertheimerism.
Sargent once portrayed Wertheimer's eldest daughter Helena, called Ena, a painter, together with her sister Betty in the house of the Wertheimer family. He created a second portrait of Ena on the occasion of the young woman's wedding. It was titled A Vele Gonfie and was later sold to help finance Ena's art gallery. Her husband later tried to buy the painting back from an American collector.
Alfred Wertheimer was a budding scientist and was portrayed as such by Sargent - with laboratory glassware and probably with specialist literature. The young man was killed in the Boer War in South Africa at the age of 25 . Edward Wertheimer, who was to become Asher Wertheimer's successor in the art business, did not get old either. He died of oyster poisoning at the age of 29. Sargent painted Edward Wertheimer with a sculpture in Paris to make his relationship to the visual arts clear.
Sargent also painted the siblings Conway, Almina and Hylda together on the country estate of Eustace H. Wilding, Essie Wertheimer's husband. He portrayed Essie himself together with her brother Ferdinand, an artist, and her sister Ruby in the home of the Wertheimer family. The series also included individual portraits of Almina, Betty and Hylda Wertheimer.
The first portrait of Flora Wertheimer
Edward Wertheimer
Ena and Betty Wertheimer
Conway, Almina and Hylda Wertheimer
Essie, Ruby and Ferdinand Wertheimer
The whereabouts of the pictures and reactions of the audience
The portraits received quite different reactions from the audience and the critics, which were often related to Asher Wertheimer's origins and social status. Wertheimer was one of the most respected art dealers in London and had wealthy customers such as the Rothschild family , whom he supplied with French furniture from the 18th century as well as paintings by European masters and especially portraits from the 17th and 18th centuries from England. Sargent's painting style and portrayal of family members were tailored to this focus.
Asher Wertheimer had already announced in 1916 that she would give nine of the portraits to the public. He died two years later, on August 9, 1918. His widow survived him by four years. After Flora Wertheimer's death in 1922, the pictures were immediately given to the National Gallery in London, where they were exhibited in a separate room. Soon afterwards they came to the Tate Gallery of British Art, where they stayed for a long time together in a room dedicated to Sargent's work. In 1999 and 2000, all twelve Wertheimer portraits were presented in a special exhibition at the Jewish Museum London.
In 1927 Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa visited the Tate Gallery. He did not dare to judge the artistic value of the pictures, but wrote in a letter on August 10, 1927: “[...] however, if the mastery of an artist consists of the intensity of the lifelike representation, of the penetration of the soul of the model to indiscretion and from projecting this soul onto the screen, then one has to admit that Sargent was one of the greatest artists of all time. ”According to Tomasi di Lampedusa, the portraits tell“ what the models would never have dared to confess ”.
“Papa Wertheimer” is said to have “the happiest and most perverted filibuster face far and wide”, his wife tries “to stink a hundred miles into the ghetto ” “to appear as a great lady” and the daughters represent “all variants of corrupted wealth”, including for example "The good-humored Strunze, perfumed and filthy and undoubtedly the lover of her» chauffeur «". Two of Asher Wertheimer's sons did not fare better in Tomasi di Lampedusa's reflections; while he described Conway as a "disgusting [...] youth", Edward appeared to him to be a characterless and incomplete member of a "club of Jewish millionaires." Only in Alfred Wertheimer's portrait did the Italian see the depiction of "a thoughtful and honest youth."
All in all, Tomasi di Lampedusa commented on Wertheimer's donation mercilessly: Asher Wertheimer gave the pictures “trustingly and not consciously of the eternal disgrace” “to which he gives himself up; because you read the word "thief" on his portrait as if it were written in scarlet letters. "
See also
A selection of the works of John Singer Sargent can be found under Selection of the works of John Singer Sargent .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Asher Wertheimer. Retrieved November 24, 2018 (UK English).
- ↑ http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=FB0C10F93F5D147A93C3A81782D85F4C8185F9
- ↑ http://www.jssgallery.org/Essay/Wertheimer_Family/JM_Intro.htm
- ^ Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, A writer on the move. On the move in the metropolises of Europe , Munich / Zurich 2009, ISBN 978-3-492-26368-9 , p. 79
- ^ Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, A writer on the move. Out and about in the metropolises of Europe , Munich / Zurich 2009, ISBN 978-3-492-26368-9 , p. 80