PIUS XII, Pope (1941)
Description:
Bust length dressed in his white robe, his hands folded before him, against a dark background. Presumably oil on canvas, 30” x 25” (76.2 x 63.5 cm), signed and dated lower right ‘A Muller Ury 1941’.
Location:
Present Whereabouts Unknown
Eugene Maria Giuseppe Giovani Pacelli was born on March2, 1876. He was elected Pope on March 2, 1939 and died on October 9, 1958.
The story has sometimes been related that Muller-Ury painted the then Cardinal Pacelli in 1936 during his visit to New York, but apparently he did not colour in the robes, and when in 1939 he was elected Pope, he painted in the white robes. However, there is no mention of meeting or painting Pacelli in his 1936 diary. Further one extant version in Switzerland is signed and dated outside the oval ‘A. Muller Ury 1941’, and the photograph of this portrait – which has a dark background not a sand coloured one – is also clearly dated 1941. There remains the possibility that the artist originally painted a dark background, had it photographed by Peter A. Juley and Son, after which he decided to lighten the background before making the version for Archbishop Spellman, and that this photograph represents the 1941 Swiss picture before those changes were made.
A version of one of these portraits was exhibited at FRENCH & CO. INC., 210, East 57th Street, New York, April 21 – May 3, 1947, No. 4. It was mentioned in American Art News, New York, Vol. XLVI, April 1947.
Muller-Ury copyrighted a version of the portrait on 21st March 1946 (New York, G.790) according to the Library of Congress, Catalog of Copyright Entries. Part 4. Works of Art, Etc. New Series.
