Rudolf Léon Ritter von Wernburg 1913
Half-length portrait in a slight side view, the head slightly tilted, the gaze turned towards the viewer, but not looking directly at him. The sitter is wearing short hair and a moustache, the ends of which are twirled up; he is also wearing a brown suit, a white shirt with a stand-up collar and a burgundy tie. The background of the painting is executed mono-chrome, with the paint changing from dark to light brown.
JQAW# P_1913_030
Oil on canvas 71 x 58 cm
Signature: J. Q. Ɑdams 913
Unknown private collection (Austria?)
Picture: Künstlerhaus Archive Vienna
Rudolf "Raoul" Léon Ritter von Wernburg 11.2.1874 Vienna to 26.11.1942 Theresienstadt (Shoa).
Rudolf/Raoul was born in 1874 into the important Jewish industrialist family Leon (also: Léon). Their Viennese founders were the three brothers Jacques (1794-1858), August (1785-1841) and Adolf (1797-1851) Löb (later changed to Leon), who had immigrated to Vienna from Alsace as of 1814 and were originally active in the production of cooking oils. Jacques Löb/Leon had six children, of whom Gustav (1839-1898) and Julius (1842-1927) Leon, who were both knighted by the Emperor (Gustav Ritter von Leon, Julius Ritter von Wernburg), became famous as industrialists and builders of representative residential palaces on Vienna's Ringstrasse, leaving a lasting mark on the cityscape. Gustav von Leon was the founder of a wholesale company, then a politician (including a member of the Reichsrat) and, at the end of his political career, bought the iron foundry and construction company Waagner, which he expanded to include bridge construction. After a merger in 1905, the company became known worldwide as Waager-Biro, recognized primarily for its innovative steel constructions (including the dome of the Reichstag in Berlin). Gustav also had the Palais Schottenring 17 built by Heinrich von Ferstel, today the headquarters of the Donau Versicherung insurance company. Julius Leon von Wernburg in turn was the founder of the mechanical cotton and sheep wool factory in Wernstadt in Bohemia. He had the Palais Leon-Wernburg Linke Wienzeile 36 (location of the Cafe Savoy), the Herminenhof on Franz-Josefs-Kai (destroyed in 1945) and also the the building Teinfaltstraße 3 built, real estate which passed to Rudolf/Raoul by inheritance and was aryanized, i.e. taken away from the owner, during the Nazi regime. Julius also acquired the castle and agricultural estate of Pichl in Styria, where he retired to in 1913 and which was sold by his son Rudolf/Raoul in 1929 (in order to finance a trip around the world for himself and his life partner according to local oral tradition).
Rudolf, who preferred to call himself Raoul, was the son of Julius Ritter von Wernburg (1842-1927) and Hermine, née Pollak von Rudin (1846-1923) and had two siblings: Rudolf Jacques (1866-1873), who died in childhood and after whom he was named, and his sister Eugenie (1867-1942), who was married to the last railroad minister of the monarchy, Dr. Franz von Banhans, and who, like her brother Rudolf/Raoul, was also victim of the Shoah.
Rudolf/Raoul's childhood and youth were of a typical upper middle-class tradition of the time: education at the elite Schottengymnasium (where he left Judaism at the age of 15 in 1889 and was baptized a Catholic, a step that his sister Hermine and later his parents were also to follow), followed by military service as a one-year volunteer and discharge as a lieutenant. (Educated elites were exempt from the monarchy's three-year military service, but could aspire to officer rank as a one-year volunteer and then serve either actively or in the reserve, a path taken by many sons of the aristocracy and the upper middle classes). In contrast to his father Julius, who was active as an entrepreneur and investor well into old age, Rudolf/Raoul's entrepreneurial activities were rather limited. Only in the period 1899-1909 does he appear in the Lehmann address book as an authorized signatory and as a representative of his father's companies. Thereafter he described himself as a retired lieutenant or as a “private”, i.e. a person without occupation and independently wealthy.
Rudolf/Raoul therefore led the lifestyle of a wealthy heir. In 1901, he was a founding member of the elite Aero Club, which was dedicated to promoting the new aviation technology, and was also a patron of the arts. Noteworthy is, among other things, a purchase of several paintings in 1893 (probably to celebrate his graduation), which was reported in the press (Wiener Zeitung 30.11.1893 p.5), including a female head study by Gustav Klimt, which he bought for a (by today’s standards) incredibly low price of 96 Gulden (around 200 crowns, equal to about 1400 euros today) and which, according to the Klimt database, is lost. (Another work of his purchases, “Helena” by Franz von Matsch, was auctioned on 20.11.2006 as lot 29 at Sothebys Paris. Provenance information for this possibly aryanized work was missing). In 1912, Rudolf/Raoul (following his father) joined the Vienna Künstlerhaus as a donor (with 6000 crowns). Donors were honored by the Künstlerhaus with a portrait in the Donors' Gallery, which were made free of charge by members of the house. The donor portrait of Rudolf/Raoul Leon von Wernburg was commissioned from Adams and executed in 1913 and already shows a more modern conception of a gentleman portrait, which was traditionally dominated by black suits and white beards (see cross-references).
Little information is available about Rudolf/Raoul's private life. He remained unmarried throughout his life. Gaugusch (Wer einmal war, Vol. II, p.1850, 2016) mentions a life partner: Max Lay (1896-1970), who advanced during the First World War from naval aspirant (1914), naval cadet (1916) to frigate lieutenant (date of promotion unknown) and later worked as a radio speaker at RAVAG and after 1945 at the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation. On October 19, 1929, Rudolf/Raoul adopted Max Lay, who subsequently went by the name Max Leon-Wernburg. (He became engaged to the actress Erzi von Zerdahelyi at Schloss Pichl in 1928 [Neu.Wr.Tagblatt 1.6.1928 p.8; no details of a marriage are available] and on 2.5.1945 married Margarete (Gretl) Seidl, 1915-1992, [Gaugusch Vol. II, p. 1858, 2016]). Max Leon-Wernburg died in 1970 without any direct descendants.
The life of Rudolf/Raoul (since 1923) Leon-Wernburg took a dramatic turn in 1938 with the Anschluss and the beginning of Nazi rule. Even as a Catholic convert, he was racially persecuted and it is puzzling why he did not flee into exile. He seems to have naively relied on his good connections and the status of a “von Wernburg” and, according to Lehmann, remained living in the family palace at Wienzeile 36 until 1940 (probably until the property was aryanized by the Roman Catholic diocese of St. Pölten [sic!]). According to Nazi files, he subsequently lived in the house at Teinfaltstrasse 3 (probably with his partner/adoptive son Max Leon-Wernburg, who appears at this address in 1941; the property was aryanized in 1943 in favour of the Greater German Reich, but restituted to Max Leon-Wernburg in 1948). In 1942, Rudolf/Raoul was forcibly relocated to a collective apartment in the Jewish 2nd district (Tandelmarktgasse) and deported from there on 13.8.1942 on transport IV/7 #235 to Theresienstadt (Terezín), where he died on 26.11.1942 (death notice: intestinal catarrh). A certain special status in the Nazi regime for him emerges from the fact that Rudolf/Raoul was deported to Terezín (and not to the Auschwitz extermination camp), that he was still listed in the files with his noble name “von Wernburg” and, most remarkably, that he was buried in a grave. Rudolf/Raoul nonetheless fell victim to the Shoa. He is buried at the national cemetery near the Small Fortress together with 17 other Austrian victims of the Nazi regime (Der Neue Mahnruf 7/8 1962 p.7). Rudolf's sister Eugenie enjoyed a certain degree of protection due to her “mixed marriage” with the prominent former minister von Banhans. However after his death in July 1942 she was also deported to Theresienstadt on the same transport (IV/7) as her brother Rudolf on August 13, 1942. She died shortly after her arrival on August 22, 1942 as a victim of the Shoah.
Cross-references
Exhibited
1913 Künstlerhaus Vienna (EL 58 1913/14 #3133).
1913-ca.1960 permanent exhibition Gallery of Donors Künstlerhaus Vienna ST90 (1960-1991 in storage).
Literature
APH, catalog raisonné JQA 1995, p. 47, cat.#16, no illustration, there not identified and dated as 1905.
Provenance
1913 commissioned from the artist for the Gallery of Donors Künstlerhaus Vienna.
1913-1991 Künstlerhaus Vienna.
1991 Sale (together with almost all paintings of the donor gallery) to private art collector Vienna.
2002 Auktion Dorotheum 19.2.2002 Lot 177.
Unknown private collection (Austria?).