Buzási Enikő szerk.: In Europe' Princely Courts, Ádám Mányoki, Actors and venues of a portraitist's career (A Magyar Nemzeti Galéria kiadványai 2003/1)
Enikő Buzási: ÁDÁM MÁNYOKI (1673-1757) Conclusions from a Monograph
there. Upon the prince's request, he ordered a mezzotint portrait - presumably after his own painting 15 - by a sofar unidentified engraver in Berlin in 1711 16 (cat. no. 27). Like representations of western European rulers and leading aristocrats, it shows the prince as a war lord, in three-quarter figure in a composition that echoes Pieter van Gunst's portrait of John Churchill, duke of Marlborough, chief commander of the English army. Though officially still in the service of Rákóczi, he appears to have already made contact within the court circles via a younger contemporary, Antoine Pesne. Of French origin, Pesne had been named painter of the Prussian court a year earlier, as Mányoki's recently recovered works prove. Pesne, whose collaboration with Mányoki was unknown for a long time, entrusted Mányoki with painting one - of Baroness Blaspiel - of the ten three-quarter-length portraits of the ladies in waiting for the Hofdamengalerie, a series that was to be exhibited in the ceremonial hall of Berlin's Monbijou palace (cat. no. 15). 17 Only five pictures of the series survive, but apart from Baroness Blaspiel's portrait, all are by the Berlin master. 18 Pesne determined the character and thematic variety of the Hofdamengalerie by depicting the ladies in some activity, thereby restricting Mányoki's compositional liberty. It was probably not only the weight of the assignment but also the lack of Ádám Mánvoki: Princess Maria Josepha Sobieska, born Wessotowska, 1713 Budapest, Hungarian National Gallerv (cat. no. 34) Ádám Mányoki: Mrs Besenval, born Countess Katarzyna Bielinska, 1713; Dresden, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister (cat. no. 35) similar experience that made Mányoki adopt the compositional practice of French engravings made after Nicolas Largillière's works with similar scenarios. The influence of the Hofdamengalerie pictures can be discerned in another Mányoki work painted during his Berlin stay, the portrait of a young woman by the toilet table, now in the Hungarian National Gallery. This work can be retraced to another French precedent, a composition by Francois de Troy (cat. no. 16). The work contact with Pesne is preserved most unambiguously by one of Mányoki's major works, his self-portrait, which can be dated to this second period in Berlin, to 1711, based on the influence of the Berlin-based painter (cat. no. 17). His choice of colours and some formal details can be clearly traced to Pesne's works, while some characteristic features of the composition are rooted in 17 th-century Dutch and German art including Johann Heinrich Roos' self-portrait. Mányoki may have known this work from an engraving by Philip Kilian, and been inspired by the figure's posture and the shirt loosely opening in front. Despite their fairly wide stylistic spectrum, these three works, dating possibly from 1711, reveal Mányoki's determined attempt to renew his portrait painting, demonstrating an interest in more diverse compositions, and richer pictorial environments. This is true, even though this change he experimented with in Berlin was short-lived, and paintings that survive from sub-
