Lot 43: JOHAN ZOFFANY R.A.

FRANKFURT 1733 - 1810 LONDON PORTRAIT OF THE ARCHDUCHESS MARIA AMALIA OF AUSTRIA, DUCHESS OF PARMA (1746-1804) oil on canvas 72.5 by 42.5 cm.; 28 1/2 by 16 3/4 in.

According to a label, verso, the private collection of Ludovica von Stumm, Baroness von Stumm (1866-1945), Schloss Ramholz, Hesse; English private collection until 2012.

This delightful portrait of Archduchess Maria Amalia of Austria (1746-1804), wife of Ferdinand I, Duke of Parma (1751-1802), is an exciting addition to Zoffany’s oeuvre. Maria Amalia was the daughter of the Habsburg Empress, Maria Theresa (1717-1780), one of Zoffany’s most important patrons, and the elder sister of Marie Antoinette, wife of Louis XVI of France. Five years her husband’s senior, she had married Ferdinand in 1769. However the union was not a success and the present painting is a remarkable commentary on the personal and political life of the court of Parma, as seen by Zoffany when he arrived there in the summer of 1778. Zoffany had then just completed his masterpiece The Tribuna of the Uffizi (Royal Collection), and was being hailed as one of the greatest artists of the modern age. The present painting further demonstrates the heightened social observation and sharp sense of humour that helped make The Tribuna such a success, for here Zoffany daringly lays open the full breakdown of the marriage between Maria Amalia and her husband. Despite Ferdinand’s intense religiosity (he built fourteen chapels, and was mocked by Louis XV for behaving like a monk), the Duke was serially addicted to what Count Giuseppe Gorani described as ‘a pinch of debauchery’,1 and was known for combining prayer with willing peasant girls. In time Maria Amalia, who had strongly resisted the marriage, embarked upon her own adulterous affairs, and she and Ferdinand were effectively separated by 1775.2 The extent to which Zoffany’s portrait makes Maria Amalia and Ferdinand’s separation clear is nonetheless surprising for what was presumably a formal commission. Here, Maria Amalia emphatically turns away from her husband, who is represented only in the form of a portrait (of a type attributed to Zoffany and known in two versions)3 placed above a conspicuously empty chair. Even in an age before ‘body language’ was ever discussed, anyone viewing the portrait would have been aware of how it reflected Maria Amalia’s relationship with Ferdinand, and one must wonder, therefore, at the extent to which she herself was aware of the significance of the composition. It is possible that the reduced size of the portrait indicates a commission meant only for private consumption, and certainly it is wholly different in approach to Zoffany’s much more formal portrayal of Maria Amalia’s four eldest children (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna), one of four other works she commissioned from the artist during his stay. Whatever the circumstances of the commission, it seems Zoffany was fascinated by the dysfunctional relationship of his patrons. In his extraordinary Self-Portrait with a Friar’s Habit, painted in Parma in 1779 (Galleria Nazionale di Parma, see fig. 1), Zoffany is seen mocking the curious mix of devotion and debauchery practised by Ferdinand. The artist portrays himself donning the habit of a Capuchin Franciscan, of whom Ferdinand was a noted adherent, but behind him pinned to the wall is a pair of finely painted condoms, hung next to a suggestively torn print of Titian’s Venus of Urbino. Even more scandalously, on the reverse of the self-portrait is painted a Holy Family, mirroring the two sided world Zoffany found himself in. The Duchess was a lady of somewhat eccentric democratic views, and Zoffany’s portrait of her, seated at her harpsichord, holding a book, conforms almost exactly to the description given of her to the English poet and hostess Lady Miller (1741-1781) in November 1770, when she was described as ‘a perfect mistress of music, [with] a charming voice, embroiders much in the tambour, and reads a good deal. She is tall, and fair, [and] never wears rouge or fard’.4 Maria Amalia remained in Parma with Ferdinand, even after Napoleon’s invasion in 1796, and despite largely living apart (she at the Castello di Sala Baganza, six miles south of Parma, whilst he preferred the palace at Colorno, nine miles to the north of the city), they managed to produce seven children together. As Duchess she presided over a short-lived regency after Ferdinand’s death in 1802, but was soon sent into exile, dying in Prague in 1804. Stylistically this portrait fits with a group of small full length portraits which Zoffany painted whilst in Italy. Close comparisons can be made, both in the composition and handling, with a portrait of Matilda Clevland, later wife of John Udney, the famous collector and English Consul at Leghorn, painted in Florence in 1777 (Private Collection, USA, see fig. 2). Previously unrecorded we are grateful to Dr Martin Postle and Charles Greig for endorsing the attribution following first hand inspection. Mary Webster has reservations about the attribution. We are further grateful to Dott. Alberto Crispo for endorsing both the attribution of the painting and the identification of the sitter based on a digital photograph. Dott. Crispo intends to publish this picture in a forthcoming article on portraiture in Parma in the autumn. The picture is also to be included in an article being prepared by Professor Robin Simon for the British Art Journal on Zoffany in Parma. 1. M. Postle (ed.), Johan Zoffany RA, Society Observed, New Haven and London 2011, p. 239. 2. For a fuller description see M. Postle, op.cit. 3. Galleria Nazionale, Parma, and in a French Private Collection. The latter shows Ferdinand with the blue sash of the French order of the Saint-Esprit, which he wears in the present portrait. 4. Lady A. Miller, Letters from Italy, 1776, vol. 1, pp. 415-17