| Remarks |
The American-German economist and art lover Friedrich Bendixen (1864-1920) was a banker in Hamburg when he commissioned Henri Goovaerts in 1912 to make a large portrait of the then famous actress Adèle Doré. The portrait was intended for the Deutsches Schauspielhaus in Hamburg. Today we only know this portrait from a black and white photograph by Rudolph Dührkoop, which is in Lily Goovaerts' archive and is depicted here. Adèle Doré is portrayed by Goovaerts in one of the roles that made her famous: the role of Mariamne, the protagonist from the tragedy Herod and Mariamne by Friedrich Hebbel. A copy of the painting was made by Sophus Hansen and is kept in the Museum für Hamburgische Geschichte in Hamburg. The dimensions of this copy are 145 x 113,5 cm. The dimensions of the original are probably comparable.
According to J. Blonden (Limburger Koerier, August 12, 1933), Henri Goovaerts called the portrait of Adèle Doré his best work. At least it was his last great work. The newspapers in Germany and the Netherlands wrote laudatory reviews about it. In September 1912 a German newspaper wrote: ‘In the large hall of the Kunstverein a portrait of the woman Adele Doré is currently exhibited, which deserves special attention because of its strong artistic qualities. [...] Hendrik Goovaerts, who had the task of portraying Adele Doré as Mariamne, masterfully understood how to let us take a look in the soul of the actress above the costume and the moment of the role, bringing to life at the same time the Hebbelish Mariamne as well as the performing woman of flesh and blood.’ (Reference: newspaper cutting from an unknown German newspaper from September 1912 in the archive of Lily Goovaerts). In a Dutch newspaper from the same period we can read: ‘The figure is represented in a white robe, with a black veil around the forehead, standing in front of a red curtain, beside from which one sees the starry sky with the comet, the blazing fire down. [...] Fate decided that this Mariamne would be his last work. Goovaerts, who lived in Maastricht, died there a few weeks ago of a heart disease in the force of the male age. As a striking testimony of his talent, the portrait of mrs. Doré survives him. The portrait that soon will be transferred from the Kunstverein to the German theater, for which the artist was commissioned by banker Fr. Bendixen to paint it.' (Reference: newspaper cutting from an unknown Dutch newspaper from September 1912 in the archive of Lily Goovaerts).
Adèle Doré (1869-1918) and Henri Goovaerts were contemporaries. The Austrian Doré received her drama education in Vienna and then moved to the Netherlands, where she regularly performed in the period 1886-1890 and studied at the Amsterdam drama school. In the last fifteen years of her life she worked for the Deutsches Schauspielhaus in Hamburg. There the paths of Doré and Goovaerts crossed. However, that might have been for the second time, for when Adèle Doré studied at the Amsterdam drama school, Henri Goovaerts studied at the Royal academy of art in the same city. It is not known whether the two did meet each other in those early days of their career, or whether this only happened at the end of Goovaerts' life in Hamburg. |
