John Mcewen comments on Richard George Archibald Lucian Hungerford Crewe-milnes, Earl of Madeley

Philip De László described his temperament as ‘lively, passionate, impulsive’. it showed in his renowned speed as a painter, which enabled him to catch a finished likeness at a sitting. his mature work has the freedom of a sketch, even in completed canvases, where invariably neutral backgrounds highlight the face and often he left portraits ‘unfinished’ except for the head and shoulders, as here.

Among his favourite artists were Reynolds and Lawrence, both of whom painted child masterpieces.

De László liked to engage his sitters in conversation to animate their expressions and encourage character-revealing opinions. his speed took artistic advantage of these exchanges. Often, friendship ensued. Marriage to Lucy Guinness, a member of a minor branch of the dynasty, eased social acceptance, particularly in england, where he settled in 1907 and immediately compounded his high Continental reputation as a portraitist. Lucy’s parents’ disapproval—he was still relatively unknown when they first met and took time to learn english—delayed the marriage for eight years.

De László was born Laub, the son of a tailor in the Jewish quarter of pest, the newer half of the hungarian capital. he hungarianised his surname, the ‘de’ signalling his ennoblement by the King of hungary in 1912. Neglect to take British nationality until 1914, the year of this portrait, cost him dear. sending money to his family in hungary and giving a token £1 to a hungarian prisoner on the run had him falsely imprisoned, from september 1917 to June 1919, as a ‘disloyal British subject’. Rightly, his popularity did not suffer. he even painted our present Queen.