Czére Andrea szerk.: A Szépművészeti Múzeum közleményei (Budapest, 2007)

ISTVÁN NÉMETH: Vanishing Hopes: The Last Will of Marcell Nemes - The Museum of Fine Arts' Acquisitions from the Nemes Estate

The first tentative news referring to the contents of the will were mostly positive, for example claiming that Marcell Nemes had left sixteenth fine paintings to the Museum of Fine Arts and that in accordance with his wishes the greater part of the anticipated income from his estate was to go into setting up a fund from which study grants would be allocated at a proportion of 20 percent for Hungarians and 25 percent for Munich artists, while the rest of the fund would be used to support writers and journalists.

12 One or two days later some shocking news emerged. It was revealed that Marcell Nemes had left behind huge debts the total of which would perhaps even exceed the value of his entire estate, raising the question whether or not after the settlement of his estate there would be anything left at all for the patronage of Hungarian art and literature and the enrichment of Hungary's museums." Marcell Nemes must have been aware of the seriousness of the situation since on 5 May, 1930 he wrote in his will that in the event of his death all of his property, both moveable and immovable, should be sold and his entire collection put up for auction, with all income derived to be used first and foremost to satisfy the demands of his creditors.

14 Thus, the hope finally faded away that the Nemes Collection would be passed on to the Hungarian state in its entirety, and indeed as later events were to prove, it began to appear doubtful that in the end the Museum of Fine Arts would even acquire the sixteen works that had been bequeathed to it in Nemes's will. Of the sixteen paintings left to the museum Nemes had named only one specific picture, i.e. Saint John the Evangelist Lamenting by Colijn de Coter, an artist active in Brussels at the beginning of the sixteenth century (fig. 1). This picture had been on deposit at the Museum of Fine Arts for years and displayed in the permanent exhibition.

15 The museum's experts were given the opportunity to select the other fifteen paintings from Nemes's collection of modern Hungarian paintings, consisting of several hundred pieces, which had also been preserved by the Museum of Fine Arts from when the collector had moved to Munich. However, Elek Petrovics did not lose hope of acquiring these works, regardless of the situation that had developed. He kept in close contact with the committee settling the will and personally participated in managing the affairs ol the estate in his capacity as an arts expert.

16 There is a record in the Museum of Fine Arts' archives containing a list of the fifteen pictures that were selected.

1. These were the following: three works by Pál Szinyei Merse: The Swing, Sleeping Woman, and View; Mihály Munkácsi's Window Niche and a study to The Hero of the Village; a landscape by László Paál; Károly Ferenczy's painting entitled In the Arbour; three works by József Rippl-Rónai: Uncle Piacsek with Dolls, Lajos Kunffys Child, and Lazarine with a Blue Vase; two still-lifes by Adolf Fényes; a Double Portrait by Géza Dósa; Landscape with Water and Sunflower by József Koszta; and Woman with Cat by János Vaszary. Precisely which ones of the