Philip Alexius de Laszlo's Marquise de Castellane
(Frontpage (Thumbnail Index)  (more on Philip Alexius de Laszlo)
 
 
 
 Marquise de Castellane
Philip Alexius de Laszlo -- British painter (1869-1937)
c. 1920?
Owner"
Medium"
Size?
Jpg: Friend of the JSS Gallery
 
Here is [possibly] the Marquise de Castellane.  I am struggling with the identification on this one.  It might be Anna Gould, who married Boniface, Marquis de Castellane, in 1895.  If it is, it would have to date between 1899 (when, according to Owen Rutter, de Laszlo painted his first french subjects, the Comte and Comtesse Jean de Castellane) and 1908 (when Anna, who had divorced Boni in 1905, re-married, and would no longer have been known as Marquise de Castellane.  So maybe in the date spot you can just put c. 1899/1908?  

Carolus-Duran  
French Artist (1837-1917) 
 
Anna Gould 
Date? 

From: M Owens 
<MO  w ens35@aol.com>
 
Date: Wed, 28 May 2003  

No way does Laszlo's "Marquise de Castellane" depict Anna Gould de Castellane, unless the artist was being laughably complimentary. Anna Gould was famously unattractive, for one: short, sallow, with crinkly hair and rather simian in appearance. For another, given the supposed date of the portrait, this identification must be wrong, since Count Boni de Castellane (1867-1932) didn't become the marquis de Castellane until 1917, when his father, Antoine, died, and by that time, he was already long divorced from Anna Gould and did not remarry.  

Based on this information, as well as the hair, pose, and draperies as compared to Laszlo's other female portraits, I think the portrait must be closer to circa 1920. Still, the attribution remains difficult, because there does not appear to have been any marquise de Castellane between Antoine de Castellane (who died in 1917) and Boni de Castellane (who died in 1932). Could Antoine de Castellane have remarried, after the death of Boni's mother? Or could the subject of the portrait be Boni's beautiful half-American daughter in law, Yvonne Patenotre, the wife of Boniface, later marquis de Castellane (1897-1946), his eldest son by Anna Gould? This would perhaps put the circa date closer to 1928, perhaps, but surely this is better than presuming that it depicts Anna Gould. 

FYI: There are three marquis de Castellane titles in France, according to the  
Bottin Mondain, the French nobiliary index ... 

Marquis de Castellane 
Marquis de Castellane Esparron 
Marquis de Castellane Majastres 

all are shorthanded, casually referred to, as Marquis de Castellane ... which  
can be confusing ... will keep digging ... 


From: Machelle Dame
(mach elle.   da me@usbank.com)
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004

I have been reading your comments regarding the Count Boni de Castellane and Anna Gould.  How hard was it to research the two?  I have recently been given old family photos and documents from my fathers side.  I have the divorce decree between the Count and Anna, photographs of him and negitives and I think a picture of her.  Your description of her fits the person in the photograph and I have not been able to place her as being anyone else.  They were my fathers foster mothers parents and I have been trying to connect the dots.  Very truly, Machelle 
 
 

Notes 
Image from Patrick Chaleyssin's Le Peinture Mondaine de 1870, a 1960 (Bibliotheque de l'Image, 1993.) 

 


By:  Natasha Wallace
Copyright 1998-2003 all rights reserved
Created 8/26/2002