Victor Luithlen 1905

Half portrait en face of a 4-year-old boy in a light blue and white striped sailor's costume with square neckline. Head with long brown hair, on it a sun hat, against a landscape background.

JQAW# P_1905_090
Watercolor/pastel on paper on canvas 56 x 48 cm (oval)
Signature: J. Q. Ɑdams 905
Belvedere Vienna Inv.No. 7692

Victor Josef Paul Luithlen, 20.5.1901 Vienna to 14.11.1987 Vienna.
Musicologist, writer, music archivist and librarian. Co-founder of the collection of historical musical instruments of the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna, a unique collection perfectly housed in the imperial setting of the Neue Hofburg. Unfortunately, it had to make way for a contemporary history museum (called a "junk store" by critics) in recent times. The 1905 boy portrait of Victor Luithlen continues the tradition of Adams' pastel portraits (compare Alice Hauser, Belvedere Vienna) and, like all of Adams' portraits of children, is immediately accessible to the viewer. There is nothing in this idyllic portrait to suggest what an important musicologist, archivist and collection director (whose role in the Nazi era is also viewed critically by some, see cross-references) the boy would later become. Dr. Luithlen dedicated his portrait to the Belvedere Vienna after his death and thus made it accessible to the public. So far, the work has not been listed in any Adams work inventories (neither KH nor APH).

Cross-references

Entry Victor Luithlen Österr. Musiklexikon

Entry Victor Luitlen, Lexicon of Provenance Research

Exhibited

Literature

Provenance

Sitter.
1988 Donation to Belvedere Vienna, Inv.#7692.