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Adolfo Müller-Ury, KSG (March 29, 1862 – July 6, 1947) was a Swiss-born American portrait painter and
impressionistic Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...
painter of roses and still life.


Early life and education

Müller was born on 29 March 1862 at
Airolo Airolo (''Airöö'' in Lombard, in ) is a municipality in the district of Leventina in the canton of Ticino in Switzerland. Geography Airolo is located in Leventina valley and the Lepontine Alps, on the southern flank of the St. Gotthard ...
,
Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...
, to a prominent patrician family that by the 18th and 19th centuries included mercenaries, lawyers, hoteliers and businessmen. Adolfo was the sixth of 19 children, most of whom survived infancy, born to Roman Catholic parents: Carl Alois Müller (1825–1887), a lawyer, was Gerichtspräsident (Presiding Judge) of the Cantonal Courts, and Genovefa (née Lombardi; 1836–1920), daughter of Felice Lombardi, Director of the Hospice on the
St Gotthard Pass The Gotthard Pass or St. Gotthard Pass (; ) at is a mountain pass in the Alps traversing the Saint-Gotthard Massif and connecting northern Switzerland with southern Switzerland. The pass lies between Airolo in the Italian-speaking canton of Ti ...
, which he took over from the Capuchin monks who had run it for centuries. The family spoke Airolese mainly, a local dialect of Ticinese Italian, as well as Swiss-German. After attending the municipal drawing school in the Ticino, and school in
Sarnen Sarnen is a small List of towns in Switzerland, historic town, a Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality, and the capital of the canton of Obwalden situated on the northern shores of Lake Sarnen () in Switzerland. It has a population of just ov ...
he was encouraged by the sculptor Vincenzo Vela (1820–1891) and possibly the Commendatore Metalli-Stresa (a family friend), to study oil painting under the local painter of religious pictures in a Nazarene-style, Melchior Paul von Deschwanden in
Stans Stans () is the capital of the Cantons of Switzerland, canton of Nidwalden (Nidwald) in Switzerland. The official language of Stans is German language, German (spoken there in the variety of Swiss Standard German), but the main language is the ...
in Switzerland (who died in Adolfo's arms in February 1881). On April 25, 1881, he entered the Munich Academy, where he stayed 18 months, studying with Professors Alexander Strähuber (1814–82), Alois Gabl (1845–93), Gyula Benczur (1844–1920), and possibly
Karl von Piloty Karl Theodor von Piloty (1 October 1826 – 21 July 1886) was a German painter, noted for his historical subjects, and recognised as the foremost representative of the realistic school in Germany. Life and work Piloty was born in Munich. His fath ...
; on the same day, a fellow Swiss called Adalbert Baggenstos (1863–97), who originated from Stans, also registered at the Munich Academy. Between Munich and Paris he spent nearly two years (1882–84) in
Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...
, studying and copying Old Masters, apparently at the instigation of the Ticinese-born artist Antonio Ciseri (1821–1891), and where he apparently painted portraits of Cardinals
Joseph Hergenröther Joseph Hergenröther (15 September 1824 – 3 October 1890) was a German Church historian and canonist, and the first Cardinal-Prefect of the Vatican Archive. Biography Born in Würzburg, he was the second son of Johann Jacob Hergenröther, ...
and Gustav Adolf Hohenlohe who were acquaintances of his uncle Josef, a Domherr in Chur, Switzerland. His known early work is necessarily varied, and includes pictures in the style of Deschwanden (usually signed Müller, Adolfo), academic drawings executed in Munich (usually signed Ad. Müller), copies of Old Masters, and early independent oils, sometimes was influenced by artists like
Robert Zünd Robert Zünd (3 May 1827, Lucerne – 15 January 1909, Lucerne) was a Switzerland, Swiss landscape painter. Life Zünd came from a middle-class family. After attending high school in his home town, he was taught drawing and painting in the studi ...
(1827–1909) and
Frank Buchser Frank (originally Franz) Buchser (1828–1890) was a Swiss painter. He is noted for his portraits of notable American figures of the post civil war period and for his works with Oriental themes. Life and work Born Franz Buchser on 15 August 18 ...
(1828–1890) which includes landscapes, genre and religious pictures. Many of these survive in the ancestral home of the Müllers in
Hospental Hospental (locally ''Oschpidall'') is a municipality in the canton of Uri in Switzerland. History Hospental is first mentioned in 1285 as ''Hospenthal''. In 1499 it was mentioned under its Latin name as ''Hospicium'', and in 1616 as ''Spithal''. ...
, Switzerland, and with surviving members of his family in the St Gotthard and elsewhere.


Career

While in Paris in late 1884, he decided to visit the United States. He arrived first in
Milwaukee Milwaukee is the List of cities in Wisconsin, most populous city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin. Located on the western shore of Lake Michigan, it is the List of United States cities by population, 31st-most populous city in the United States ...
, and then visited
Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...
and
St Paul, Minnesota Saint Paul (often abbreviated St. Paul) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Minnesota and the county seat of Ramsey County, Minnesota, Ramsey County. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, ...
, where he had relatives. In 1885 he went to Baltimore to paint
James Cardinal Gibbons James Cardinal Gibbons (July 23, 1834 – March 24, 1921) was an American Catholic prelate who served as Apostolic Vicar of North Carolina from 1868 to 1872, Bishop of Richmond from 1872 to 1877, and as Archbishop of Baltimore from 1877 unti ...
for the first time and in 1886 completed a full-length portrait which was given to the Cardinal for his residence after being exhibited at Schaus's Gallery in New York (missing). At around this time he was travelling all over the eastern United States painting and executed a very large canvas of the
Bushkill Falls Bushkill Falls is a series of eight privately owned waterfalls, the tallest of which cascades over , located in Lehman Township, Pennsylvania in the Pocono Mountains. Water of the Little Bush Kill and Pond Run Creek descends the mountain, towar ...
in Pennsylvania ( Von der Heydt Museum, Wuppertal, Germany). Luckily for the artist, his talent for portraiture was soon noticed by the St. Paul railroad builder James J. Hill, who was to commission or acquire many pictures of himself, his family, his friends and business associates, like the Canadian missionary Father
Albert Lacombe Albert Lacombe (28 February 1827 – 12 December 1916), known as Father Lacombe, was a French-Canadian Roman Catholic missionary who travelled among and evangelism, evangelized the Cree and also visited the Blackfoot First Nations in Canada, Fi ...
in 1895, and
John Stewart Kennedy John Stewart Kennedy (January 4, 1830 – October 30, 1909) was a Scottish-born American businessman, financier and philanthropist. He was a member of the Jekyll Island Club (also known as The Millionaires' Club) on Jekyll Island, Georgia al ...
the financier in 1901. In the
Newark Museum The Newark Museum of Art, formerly known as the Newark Museum, in Newark, New Jersey is the state's largest museum. It holds major collections of American art, decorative arts, contemporary art, and arts of Asia (including a large collection of T ...
, New Jersey, is a portrait of a little girl dressed in pink called Miss Brandeis which is probably his first commissioned picture made in America (it is signed with a variation of his family name, A. Lombardi-Muller), though a portrait of Father Joseph Fransioli, who was minister to the large influx of Italian-speaking immigrants arriving in New York, today at the
Brooklyn Historical Society The Center for Brooklyn History (CBH, formerly known as the Brooklyn Historical Society) is a museum, library, and educational center founded in 1863 that preserves and encourages the study of Brooklyn's 400-year history of Brooklyn, history. Th ...
, was possibly completed before this as it is signed Adolph Muller. It would seem that from quite early on he wanted to sign his works in a way that was unique to him, and so portraits between 1886 and 1889 are sometimes signed F. Adolphus Muller, A. Muller-Uri, or Muller d'Uri. By 1890 this was fully anglicized as A. Muller-Ury, the umlaut in his surname being dropped. Some of his later smaller works are signed A M Ury. (As late as 1932, the Swiss-American Historical Society published a book on Swiss-Americans where his name was inaccurately stated as Adolph Felix Muller-Uri.) In 1889 he painted a portrait of John R. Brady a New York Judge which was apparently presented to the American Bar Association. He may have travelled in North Africa in the summer of 1889 after visiting the Exposition Universelle as he dated a ''Portrait of a North African man with a Gun'' (previously known as ''Portrait of an Arab''; Private Collection, London) that year and exhibited a picture called ''In the Dark Continent'' at the National Academy of Design in New York at the end of that year (No. 105; lost). In 1890 he completed a second bust-length portrait o
Father Joseph Fransioli
of Brooklyn (lost). His New York studio 1885–1904 was in the Sherwood Studio Building, 58 West 57th Street and 6th Avenue (the building has been long demolished), where he is noted before 1889 in Room C; by 1894 he had a studio with a waiting room (both lit by windows) and a bedroom. Other artists who rented studios in the building in the 1880s were his friend from Munich,
Jan Chełmiński Jan Chełmiński, also known as Jan van Chelminski, born Jan Władysław Chełmiński (Brzustów, Łódź Voivodeship, Brzustów, 27 January 1851 – 1925), was a Polish painter. Life Chełmiński entered the Munich Academy of Fine Arts on 14 Ap ...
(who later married the sister of art dealer Roland Knoedler), landscape painter Robert W. Van Boskerck, James Carroll Beckwith, painter and muralist
Edwin Howland Blashfield Edwin Howland Blashfield (December 5, 1848October 12, 1936) was an American painter and muralist, most known for painting the murals on the dome of the Library of Congress Main Reading Room in Washington, DC. Biography Blashfield was born i ...
, and painter turned critic Arthur Hoeber, and later artists such as Carle Blenner and portraitist George Burroughs Torrey. He was photographed in his Sherwood studio by artist turned photographer Edwin Scott Bennett (1847–1915) which was exhibited at the annual exhibition of the Society of Amateur Photographers of New York in 1894. For a number of years he commuted between New York and Europe. In 1892, after the great success of his portraits of Senator
Chauncey Depew Chauncey Mitchell Depew (April 23, 1834April 5, 1928) was an American attorney, businessman, and Republican politician. He is best remembered for his two terms as United States Senator from New York and for his work for Cornelius Vanderbilt, a ...
in 1890 (
Yale Club of New York City The Yale Club of New York City, commonly called The Yale Club, is a private club in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Its membership is restricted almost entirely to alumni and faculty of Yale University. The Yale Club has a worldwide membe ...
) and Mrs Theodore Havemeyer in 1891 (now the property of the Preservation Society of Newport County, Rhode Island), he applied for United States citizenship. It was apparently at this date that he met the young art dealer Joseph Duveen, who was to become a close friend, and after 1891 that he began to be dubbed 'Painter to the Four Hundred', referring to the elite of New York society in whose circles he socialized. He was much aided by the Havemeyers, and also by Louis Benziger (1840–1896), a Roman Catholic publisher ( Benziger Brothers), who persuaded many New Yorkers to sit for him; he remained friendly with his son Bruno Benziger until his death, and indeed Bruno Benziger organized the artist's burial. For three years in the late 1890s he leased one of the studios in Pembroke Studios in Kensington, London, where he certainly painted portraits of Donald Smith, 1st Baron Strathcona and Mount Royal, and
Lord Mount Stephen George Stephen, 1st Baron Mount Stephen, (5 June 1829 – 29 November 1921), known as Sir George Stephen, Bt, between 1886 and 1891, was a Canadian businessman. Originally from Scotland, he made his fame in Montreal and was the first Canadian t ...
who were business associates of James J. Hill, of whom he made an
etching Etching is traditionally the process of using strong acid or mordant to cut into the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design in intaglio (incised) in the metal. In modern manufacturing, other chemicals may be used on other type ...
in London in 1898 which was distributed to Hill's family and colleagues. According to a letter he wrote to Hill he started the portrait of Consuelo Yznaga, the 8th Duchess of Manchester, in London in 1898, but it is not known if it was ever completed. In 1903 he was one of a group of artists who invested in a new studio building, the Atelier Building, 33 West 67th Street. Muller-Ury lived in the top floor right studio, and incorporated a stained glass panel of the Müller coat-of-arms into the window (removed in 1947 and now at the Haus Müller in
Hospental Hospental (locally ''Oschpidall'') is a municipality in the canton of Uri in Switzerland. History Hospental is first mentioned in 1285 as ''Hospenthal''. In 1499 it was mentioned under its Latin name as ''Hospicium'', and in 1616 as ''Spithal''. ...
, Switzerland). The floors were all inlaid with borders of intarsia, and the smaller windows given mullions. He moved into the studio in 1904 and remained there until 1947.


Painter of prominent people

''Political figures: * Emperor William II (1909, at the New Palace, Potsdam) given to Columbia University's Deutsches Haus by the Neue-Yorker Staats Zeitung who commissioned it, but missing since the 1960s; the bust-length oil sketch is now at the Max-Planck Institute in Berlin. * President William McKinley seated in 1899 (lost), the standing version (1900, redated 1901) is now at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington * General Ulysses S. Grant (1897) since 1899 at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington * Varina Howell (Mrs Jefferson Davis) in 1895 (Beauvoir, Biloxi, Mississippi) and her daughter Winnie Davis in 1897–98 (Museum of the Confederacy,
Richmond, Virginia Richmond ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the Commonwealth (U.S. state), U.S. commonwealth of Virginia. Incorporated in 1742, Richmond has been an independent city (United States), independent city since 1871. ...
, a gift from the artist, 1918) *
Theodore Roosevelt Theodore Roosevelt Jr. (October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), also known as Teddy or T.R., was the 26th president of the United States, serving from 1901 to 1909. Roosevelt previously was involved in New York (state), New York politics, incl ...
(Edmund Morris Collection). * Edith Galt (Mrs Woodrow Wilson; a wedding present from Colonel Edward M. House, 1916), now at the White House * President Wilson delivering his "war speech" before Congress on April 3, 1917 (at the League of Nations in Geneva, the gift of Lord Duveen in 1935), and a smaller portrait painted at the same time was given by the artist in 1943 to Mrs
Cordell Hull Cordell Hull (October 2, 1871July 23, 1955) was an American politician from Tennessee and the longest-serving U.S. Secretary of State, holding the position for 11 years (1933–1944) in the administration of President Franklin Delano Roosevel ...
for the Woodrow Wilson Birthplace Foundation in
Staunton, Virginia Staunton ( ) is an independent city (United States), independent city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), U.S. Commonwealth of Virginia. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 25,750. In Virginia, independent cities a ...
. Several Swiss politicians who became Presidents: * Louis Ruchonnet (Musée des Beaux-Arts, Lausanne) * Bernhard Hammer * Giuseppe Motta, a three-quarter seated portrait, in 1938 for the authorities in Bellinzona (now in the Archivio Cantonale, Bellinzona), as well as a half-length portrait in 1939 which is now in the Adolfo Müller-Ury Stiftung, Hospental. He also painted the first permanent diplomatic representative of Switzerland in the United Kingdom, then Swiss Minister in London, Dr Charles Daniel Bourcart of Basel (now at the Swiss Embassy in London). ''The Roman Catholic Hierarchy:'' *
Francesco Satolli Francesco Satolli (21 July 1839 – 8 January 1910) was an Italian theologian, professor, cardinal, and the first Apostolic Delegate to the United States. Biography He was born on 21 July 1839, at Marsciano near Perugia. He was educated at ...
(Cardinal Satolli) first Papal Nuncio in the United States (three-quarter seated, 1893) * Archbishop John Ireland of St Paul (twice) *
Pope Pius X Pope Pius X (; born Giuseppe Melchiorre Sarto; 2 June 1835 – 20 August 1914) was head of the Catholic Church from 4 August 1903 to his death in August 1914. Pius X is known for vigorously opposing Modernism in the Catholic Church, modern ...
in 1907 (
Pontifical North American College The Pontifical North American College (NAC) is a Catholic Church, Roman Catholic educational institution in Rome, Italy, that prepares seminarians to become priests in the United States and elsewhere. The NAC also provides a residence for Prie ...
, Rome) which was a commission from Mrs Anne Weightman Walker of Philadelphia, again in 1908 (St Joseph's Seminary, Yonkers) and in 1911 (Catholic University of America, Washington) all three-quarters seated; also a number of smaller head and shoulder portraits painted in these years * Papal Secretary of State Cardinal
Rafael Merry del Val Rafael Merry del Val y Zulueta, (10 October 1865 – 26 February 1930) was a Spanish Catholic bishop, Vatican official, and cardinal. Before becoming a cardinal, he served as the secretary of the papal conclave of 1903 that elected Pope Pius ...
in 1907 (Historisches Museum von Uri, Altdorf) * Archbishop Dr. Thomas F. Kennedy, 1907 (St. Charles Borromeo Seminary, Overbrook, PA) and 1911 (Pontifical North American College, Rome) * Monsignor Gaetano Bisleti * Cardinal John Murphy Farley (1913) *
Désiré-Joseph Mercier Désiré Félicien François Joseph Mercier (21 November 1851 – 23 January 1926) was a Belgian Catholic prelate who served as Archbishop of Mechelen from 1906 until his death in 1926. A Thomist scholar, he had several of his works translated i ...
(Cardinal Mercier) during his visit to the United States, often misleadingly stated to be at Catholic University at Washington but actually in Switzerland at the Stiftung Adolfo Müller-Ury in
Hospental Hospental (locally ''Oschpidall'') is a municipality in the canton of Uri in Switzerland. History Hospental is first mentioned in 1285 as ''Hospenthal''. In 1499 it was mentioned under its Latin name as ''Hospicium'', and in 1616 as ''Spithal''. ...
, Canton Uri *
Pope Benedict XV Pope Benedict XV (; ; born Giacomo Paolo Giovanni Battista della Chiesa, ; 21 November 1854 – 22 January 1922) was head of the Catholic Church from 1914 until his death in January 1922. His pontificate was largely overshadowed by World War I a ...
in 1920 (Catholic University of America, Washington, and at the Stiftung Adolfo Müller-Ury in
Hospental Hospental (locally ''Oschpidall'') is a municipality in the canton of Uri in Switzerland. History Hospental is first mentioned in 1285 as ''Hospenthal''. In 1499 it was mentioned under its Latin name as ''Hospicium'', and in 1616 as ''Spithal''. ...
, Canton Uri) * Monsignor Charles O'Hern, 1920 (Pontifical North American College, Rome) *
Pope Pius XI Pope Pius XI (; born Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti, ; 31 May 1857 – 10 February 1939) was head of the Catholic Church from 6 February 1922 until his death in February 1939. He was also the first sovereign of the Vatican City State u ...
in 1923 for which he was made a Knight of St Gregory the Great (two versions, the bust-length at St Joseph's Seminary, Yonkers and Pontifical North American College, Rome; the standing version at the Historisches Museum von Uri, Altdorf ut dated later, and full-length seated in 1930 for which he was raised to the title of Papal Count – this portrait was painted expressly to hang permanently in the Nuova Pinacoteca but is no longer in the Vatican storerooms. * Cardinal
Patrick Joseph Hayes Patrick Joseph Hayes (November 20, 1867 – September 4, 1938) was an American Catholic prelate who served as Archbishop of New York from 1919 until his death. He was elevated to the cardinalate in 1924. Early life and education Patrick Ha ...
(1924, cut down, Cardinal's Residence, NYC) * Cardinal Bonaventura Cerretti (1930) ''Famous international opera singers:'' * Emma Calvé (full-length, 1894, lost) and a vigorous pastel (Private Collection, London) * Pol Plançon (1897), a commission from Emma Marcy Raymond the composer of the operettas ''Doretta'' and ''The Sheik'' *
Marcella Sembrich Prakseda Marcelina Kochańska (February 15, 1858 – January 11, 1935), known professionally as Marcella Sembrich, was a Polish dramatic coloratura soprano. She is known for her extensive range of two and a half octaves, precise intonation, ch ...
(1899, twice), both lost *
Lina Cavalieri Natalina "Lina" Cavalieri (25 December 1874 – 7 February 1944) was an Italian operatic dramatic soprano, actress, and monologist. Biography Lina Cavalieri was born on Christmas Day at Viterbo, some north of Rome. She lost her parents at the ...
(1907, Metropolitan Opera House, New York) * Dame
Nellie Melba Dame Nellie Melba (born Helen Porter Mitchell; 19 May 186123 February 1931) was an Australian operatic lyric coloratura soprano. She became one of the most famous singers of the late Victorian era and the early twentieth century, and was the f ...
(1908) * Frances Alda (1910), lost ''Popular actresses:'' *
Lillian Russell Lillian Russell (born Helen Louise Leonard; December 4, 1860 or 1861 – June 6, 1922) was an American actress and singer. She became one of the most famous actresses and singers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, praised for her beaut ...
(1902), a full-length standing, a bust-length oval and a pastel profile (National Portrait Gallery, Washington DC) * Margaret Illington (1906; at the time of her marriage to theatre manager
Daniel Frohman Daniel Frohman (August 22, 1851 – December 26, 1940) was an American theatrical producer and manager, and an early film producer. Biography Frohman was born to a Jewish family in Sandusky, Ohio. His parents were Henry (1826–1899) and Ba ...
) ''Other sitters include:'' * Benjamin Altman, department store owner and art collector (the portrait of Altman seated in his gallery with a vase on a table beside him was given to the Altman Foundation in 1913 but is now missing – a smaller portrait is in the New York State Museum at Albany) *
Stephen Birch Stephen Birch (March 24, 1872 – December 29, 1940) was an American mining executive who served as president of the Kennecott Copper Company, and would eventually control a major share of the world's copper production. Early life Stephen Bi ...
President of the Kennecott Mining Co. (1911) * Mrs. Hobart Chatfield-Taylor, daughter of Senator Farwell of Chicago, wife of popular novelist Hobart Chatfield-Taylor * James Constable (two versions, three-quarter seated in the American Museum of Natural History, New York; a bust-length in the New York State Museum at Albany) * Margaret French Cresson, a sculptor and daughter of
Daniel Chester French Daniel Chester French (April 20, 1850 – October 7, 1931) was an American sculpture, sculptor in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His works include ''The Minute Man'', an 1874 statue in Concord, Massachusetts, and his Statue of Abr ...
(1912, formerly at Chesterwood) *
Marcus Daly Marcus Daly (December 5, – November 12, 1900) was an Irish-born American businessman known as one of the four Copper Kings of Butte, Montana, United States. Early life Daly emigrated from County Cavan, Ireland, to the United States as a youn ...
, the copper magnate (half-length, Mineral Museum, Montana Tech at the University of Montana, Butte) * Senator
Chauncey Depew Chauncey Mitchell Depew (April 23, 1834April 5, 1928) was an American attorney, businessman, and Republican politician. He is best remembered for his two terms as United States Senator from New York and for his work for Cornelius Vanderbilt, a ...
many times and both of his wives * Dorothy 'Dolly' Duveen as a girl in 1914 (full-length) and a bust-length at the time of her engagement (both lost) * Elizabeth Wharton Drexel (Mrs John Vinton Dahlgren) (Georgetown University, Washington DC) * Mrs Karl Evans (1904, for her paternal grandmother Nancy Ganson – the sitter became famous later as Mabel Dodge Luhan, patron of the avant-garde and correspondent of
Gertrude Stein Gertrude Stein (February 3, 1874 – July 27, 1946) was an American novelist, poet, playwright, and art collector. Born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania (now part of Pittsburgh), and raised in Oakland, California, Stein moved to Paris in 1903, and ...
) * Charles Mather Ffoulke, manufacturer and collector of the Barberini tapestries * Mrs Joseph Frelinghuysen (Emily Brewster) and her son Joseph, wife of New Jersey Senator Joseph S. Frelinghuysen (1916, Newark Museum, New Jersey) * Commodore
Elbridge Thomas Gerry Elbridge Thomas Gerry (December 25, 1837 – February 18, 1927), usually called "Commodore" Gerry due to the office he held with the New York Yacht Club from 1886 to 1892, was an American lawyer and reformer. His paternal grandfather was U.S. ...
(New York Yacht Club) * Mrs James D. Goin, daughter of Samuel N. Pike, builder of Pike's Opera House, and sister of artist Alice Pike Barney * Thomas Watt Gregory, US Attorney General (1917, Department of Justice, Washington) * Marcus Alonzo Hanna (1902/3, Western Reserve Historical Society,
Cleveland, Ohio Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Cuyahoga County. Located along the southern shore of Lake Erie, it is situated across the Canada–United States border, Canada–U.S. maritime border ...
) * James J. Hill (many times), most notably in 1902, formerly held in the collection of the New York Chamber of Commerce and later in the Americana collection of Credit Suisse First Boston, New York, and sold by them in 2016 * Emily Key Hoffman, mother of fashion expert
Diana Vreeland Diana Vreeland (September 29, 1903 – August 22, 1989) was an American fashion columnist and editor. She worked for the fashion magazine ''Harper's Bazaar'' and as editor-in-chief at '' Vogue'', later becoming a special consultant to the Costume ...
* Elise Ladew, later Mrs William R. Grace, whose brother was gardener Harvey Ladew, friend of King Edward VIII (Private Collection,
Ketchum, Idaho Ketchum is a city in Blaine County, Idaho, United States. Located in the central part of the state, the population was 3,555 at the 2020 census, up from 2,689 in 2010. Located in the Wood River Valley, Ketchum is adjacent to Sun Valley and ...
) *
William d'Alton Mann William d'Alton Mann (September 27, 1839 – May 17, 1920) was a Union officer in the American Civil War, a businessman, and a newspaper and magazine publisher. Early life He was born in Sandusky, Ohio on September 27, 1839. Career During the ...
the editor of '' Town Topics'' * William R. Merriam of St. Paul (three-quarters seated; Minnesota Historical Society) and a head and shoulders study now in the Preservation Society of Newport * J. Pierpont Morgan some eight times from 1904 (all missing), and with his granddaughter Mabel Satterlee * Mrs Frederick Neilson, mother of Mrs Reginald Vanderbilt (lost) * Lewis Nixon, naval constructor – also a full-length of his son Stanhope Wood Nixon in Scottish costume * Judge Morgan O'Brien (twice) and his daughter, Madeleine (later Mrs. Stuart D. Preston, mother of art criti
Stuart Preston
* Oswald Ottendorfer of the '' Neue-Yorker Staats-Zeitung'' (twice) * Judge
Alton B. Parker Alton Brooks Parker (May 14, 1852 – May 10, 1926) was an American judge. He was the Democratic nominee in the 1904 United States presidential election, losing in a landslide to incumbent Republican Theodore Roosevelt. A native of upstate New ...
(two versions) * Madame Felipe Pardo Y Barreda, the wife of the Vice-President of Peru, with her daughter Ana (1917, lost) * Alice Pfizer, daughter of
Charles Pfizer Karl Christian Friedrich Pfizer (; March 22, 1824October 19, 1906), known as Charles Pfizer, was a German-American businessman and chemist who co-founded the Pfizer pharmaceutical company with his cousin, Charles F. Erhart, in 1849, as Chas. Pf ...
Sr. and pharmaceuticals heiress, later Baroness Bachofen-Echt (Private Collection, London) * Lulu Pfizer, daughter of Charles Pfizer Jr., and first wife of Major General Spencer Edmund Hollond CB, CMG, DSO * George Lockhart Rives (1915, Columbia University) * William Culver Roberts Jr. who had published the immensely popular ''The Boy’s Account of It: A Chronicle of Foreign Travel by an Eight-Year Old'' in 1909 * Mrs George Reuling (Elisa Kulp), wife of Baltimore ophthalmologist, Dr George Reuling, Professor at the Baltimore Medical School and art collector * Cornelia Ruppert, of the New York brewing family, posthumously, the first wife of the conductor
Nahan Franko Nahan Franko (July 23, 1861 - June 7, 1930) was an American violinist, conductor and concert promoter. His brother was violinist and conductor Sam Franko. Biography Franko was born in New Orleans on July 23, 1861. He studied the violin in Eu ...
* Count Antoine Seilern alone (1906 and 1909), and with his two older brothers Charles and Oswald when children (1906), their mother Antoinette, aunt Carola Woerishoffer and grandmother, Mrs Charles Woerishoffer * Susan Steell, daughter of dramatist and writer Willis Steell *
Florence Sutro Florence Sutro (May 1, 1865 – April 27, 1906), sometimes known as Mrs. Theodore Sutro, was a lawyer and organizer, most known for creating the National Federation of Women's Music Clubs and being its first president. Biography Florence Edith C ...
(Mrs Theodore Sutro), founder and first president of the National Federation of Women's Music Clubs of America * Natica Terry, later Countess Stanislas de Castellane, and her mother Madame Francesco Terry y Sanchez of the Château de Rochecotte, France (Private Collection, London) * Mrs Benjamin Thaw (1915) and Alexander Blair Thaw (posthumously, 1918) * Mr and Mrs William Scheide and Mr and Mrs John H. Scheide (apparently in Princeton, New Jersey) * William Weightman (manufacturing chemist, posthumously) of Philadelphia, and his daughter Mrs Anne Walker (later Mrs Frederic Courtland Penfield) with her niece Mrs Richard Meirs * Miss Olive Whitman as a baby (Preservation Society, Newport) and her father Senator Charles S. Whitman (New York State Capitol,
Albany, New York Albany ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. It is located on the west bank of the Hudson River, about south of its confluence with the Mohawk River. Albany is the oldes ...
) * Captain Gilbert C. Wiltse, who raised the U.S. flag on
Honolulu Honolulu ( ; ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Hawaii, located in the Pacific Ocean. It is the county seat of the Consolidated city-county, consolidated City and County of Honol ...
in January 1893


Painter of roses and still lifes

In 1896 A Boston newspaper reported that, ‘... Mr. Müller-Ury, the portrait painter, who has just returned from abroad, has taken an attractive studio in Everett street, Newport, the one occupied by Mr. Harper Pennington last season. Mr. Müller-Ury’s roses as well as his portraits are admired, and he is painting a huge basket of American Beauties for the Havemeyer villa.’ In a surviving photograph of the artist’s studio in the Sherwood taken in 1894 (a portrait of Monsignor Satolli is on the easel next to it) there is huge still life, and in a letter from his studio to James J. Hill dated 12 August 1895 (Hill Papers, St. Paul, MN) he says that he hopes that the 'flower peace ic he sent to him 'will suit for the place intended for', further evidence that he had painted some still lifes before 1896. After 1918 the style of his still lifes becomes more
impressionistic Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...
, the technique more painterly and using a great deal of impasto, and usually depict roses in Chinese vases from the former collection of J. Pierpont Morgan that he copied at the galleries of Duveen Brothers in New York (Duveen's exhibited the Morgan collection in 1919) and elsewhere, and sometimes including depictions of other works of art like bronze or biscuit porcelain statuettes,
Chinese porcelain Chinese ceramics are one of the most significant forms of Chinese art and ceramics globally. They range from construction materials such as bricks and tiles, to hand-built pottery vessels fired in bonfires or kilns, to the sophisticated Chinese ...
Buddhas, Italian maiolica plates and so on. It is known he was an admirer of
Claude Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, ; ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of Impressionism painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During his ...
and others, as he told the German Kaiser – who hated the
Impressionists Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage of time), ordinary subjec ...
– in 1909 that the Impressionists had "done a great deal to awaken modern art." The roses were claimed by the soprano Jessica Dragonette in her autobiography to be the varieties American Beauty (red), La France (pink), Belle of Portugal (pale pink), Claudius, Killarney (rose pink), and Boucher-Pierné, but there were others. Many of his impressionistic rose paintings were created after he moved to California.


Californian sojourn

In March 1922 he travelled with Sir Joseph Duveen (later Lord Duveen) to California for the first time, in order that Duveen could deliver to bibliophile and art collector Henry E. Huntington Gainsborough's famous picture ''The Blue Boy'' which Huntington had bought the previous year. Duveen had promised the artist that Huntington would commission a portrait of himself. He did not. Müller-Ury liked California and after painting Archbishop
Edward Joseph Hanna Edward Joseph Hanna (July 21, 1860 – July 10, 1944) was an American prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as archbishop of San Francisco from 1915 to 1935. Early life and education Edward Hanna was born in Rochester, New York, ...
in
San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...
in 1923 decided the following year to erect a studio near Huntington's estate. The studio he built was at the corner of Monterey and Shenandoah Roads in
San Marino San Marino, officially the Republic of San Marino, is a landlocked country in Southern Europe, completely surrounded by Italy. Located on the northeastern slopes of the Apennine Mountains, it is the larger of two European microstates, microsta ...
(architect Carleton Winslow), in the fashionable Spanish style with a green tiled roof and in the studio an enormous north-facing window. He placed the Muller coat-of-arms on the east frontage, where it may be found today. The gardens were extensively planted with many varieties of roses including Radiance, Columbia, Rose Marie, Irish Charm, Imperial Potentate and American Beauty which he painted into his canvases depicting the Morgan porcelains begun in New York. Duveen built a bungalow next door to the artist on Shenandoah Road, but seems to have quickly sold it after the death of his client Henry E. Huntington in 1927. It was in San Marino during the following years, that Muller-Ury executed portraits of the following sitters: * Mary Brockway Metcalf, Huntington's granddaughter * Henry Mauris Robinson, the diplomat * Anita Baldwin (daughter of Lucky Baldwin of Arcadia, full-length, today at the Los Angeles County Arboretum & Botanic Garden) * Maurice DeMond, founder of the Breakfast Club then in Griffith Park * Mrs Carrie Ada Lawless, wife of William J. Lawless, the Mayor of Sierra Madre 1928–1929 (today at the Sierre Madre Women's Club) * President Rufus B. von KleinSmid (1931) of the University of Southern California (three-quarter length; deaccessioned by the university in the 1980s). In 1926, Müller-Ury seems to have begun from a photograph of a portrait of Henry E. Huntington standing (now at the Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena) and a seated one (which was engraved by Witherspoon) as well as another smaller seated version which was acquired by John and Elizabeth Huntington Metcalf; his portrait of their daughter Mary Brockway Metcalf was for some years hanging in the lobby to the office of the Director of the Huntington Library. In 1930, Müller-Ury painted the former Miss Gladys Quarré of San Francisco (then Mrs Frederick Peabody of Montecito, Santa Barbara); later she became known as Gladys Quarré Knapp, a socialite and friend of many Hollywood actors. He also painted a large allegorical work entitled ''The Spirit of California'' a version of which was acquired by a prominent art collector called Fred Elbridge Keeler (lost). Müller-Ury abandoned the studio for the last time on September 3, 1933, after which it was let to friends. The house was apparently used by the Red Cross during the Second World War. He sold it in January 1947 for about half its value because nobody was prepared at that time to buy a property where most rooms were comparatively small except for the enormous studio.


Last years

After his return from California he settled permanently back in his New York studio. In 1936 he travelled to Europe and he may have done so in 1937 and certainly in 1938 when he painted a large portrait of President Motta of Switzerland, for his home town of Bellinzona (Archivio Cantonale). In 1937 he painted a portrait of Ellen Dunlap Hopkins, founder of the New York School of Applied Design for Women which he presented to the School in 1938 (Private collection, Brooklyn). He painted
Pope Pius XII Pope Pius XII (; born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli; 2 March 18769 October 1958) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 2 March 1939 until his death on 9 October 1958. He is the most recent p ...
in 1936 during his visit to the United States when still Cardinal Pacelli, only finishing the work in 1939 (by painting in the white robes after his election to the pontificate), and painted his friend Cardinal
Francis Spellman Francis Joseph Spellman (May 4, 1889 – December 2, 1967) was an Catholic Church in the United States, American Catholic prelate who served as Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York, Archbishop of New York from 1939 until his death in 1967. F ...
of New York twice in 1940 (St Joseph's Seminary, Yonkers) one version being presented by Manhattan College to Fordham University in 1941 (who appear to have lost the work), and again in 1942; he also painted Archbishop Joseph Rummell of New Orleans (1943). In 1940, he painted the then-famous radio soprano Jessica Dragonette ( Georgian Court College, New Jersey) and several times thereafter, his last portrait in 1946 depicting her bust-length in a gold fez. In 1941 he produced a portrait of her sister Rosalinda (always called Nadea) Loftus looking over her shoulder. He also painted Dragonette's colleague Fred Mitchell, and several portraits of her friends and acquaintances. In 1942, at age 80, he painted a three-quarter length seated portrait of Mrs George H. Ingalls (née Katharine Davis Hinkle), whose late husband, a descendant of one of the founder families of America who had left
Lincolnshire Lincolnshire (), abbreviated ''Lincs'', is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East Midlands and Yorkshire and the Humber regions of England. It is bordered by the East Riding of Yorkshire across the Humber estuary to th ...
in 1628, had been a Vice-President of the New York Central Railroad.


Death

Müller-Ury died, apparently of cancer, on July 6, 1947, at the
Lenox Hill Hospital Lenox Hill Hospital (LHH) is a nationally ranked 450 bed non-profit, Tertiary care, tertiary, research and academic medical center located on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City, servicing the tri-state area. LHH is one of the reg ...
, New York and is buried in New Calvary Cemetery, Queens, New York, where his gravestone is marked simply, if incorrectly, 'ADOLPH MULLER-URY 1862–1947'. On Thursday, July 10, 1947, a Requiem Mass was held for the artist in St. Patrick's Cathedral. After his death his youngest brother Otto Müller travelled to New York to settle his estate. Most of his studio contents, and a good many of his pictures, were sold in two sales at the Plaza Art Galleries, 28 and 29 November 1947 (No. 2809) and 5 December 1947 (No. 2813), including his oil sketch of Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany, and the portrait of Lina Cavalieri. The Frick Art Reference Library, New York, has a copy of both catalogues, where the prices for his pictures are marked; three extra lots were included in the second sale.


Exhibitions

Müller-Ury exhibited single pictures and groups of pictures in the following venues (the list is not exhaustive): *1884, Schweizerisches Kunstaustellung, Berne. *1886, SCHAUS’S ART GALLERY, 204 5th Avenue, (at Madison Square) New York. *1888, Kunstmuseum, Berne. *1888–89, First National Art Exhibition of Pictures by Swiss Artists (TRAVELLING EXHIBITION): Berne, Herisau, Lucerne, Aargau, Lausanne, Basel, Geneva. *1888, INTERNATIONAL FINE ARTS EXHIBITION, MUNICH. *1889, National Academy of Design, New York. *1889, MYERS & HEDIAN, North Charles Street, Baltimore, Maryland. *1889, EXPOSITION UNIVERSELLE, Paris. *1890, National Academy of Design, New York. *1890, PARIS SALON – Galerie des Artistes-Modernes, rue de la Paix, 5. *1891, M. KNOEDLER & CO., 170 5th Avenue, New York. *1892, Second National Art Exhibition of Pictures by Swiss Artists, Berne. *1894, February 1–15, MESSRS. M. KNOEDLER & CO., 170 Fifth Avenue (corner 22nd Street), New York. *1894, November 1–22, NATIONAL ACADEMY OF DESIGN, New York, ‘Loan Exhibition of Portraits of Women’ *1894, THE CORCORAN GALLERY OF ART, Washington D.C. *1895, M. KNOEDLER & Co., 170, Fifth Avenue (corner Twenty-second Street), New York. *1895, October 31 – December 7, NATIONAL ACADEMY OF DESIGN, New York, ‘Loan Exhibition of Portraits’. *1896, NATIONAL ACADEMY OF DESIGN, New York. *1896, THE CORCORAN GALLERY OF ART, Washington D.C. *1897, March 1–15 – DURAND-RUEL GALLERIES, 389, Fifth Avenue, New York (one man show) – following an exhibition by Camille Pissarro and preceding one by Auguste Renoir) *1898, SCHAUS’S ART GALLERY, New York. *1898–99, NATIONAL ACADEMY OF DESIGN, New York, ‘Loan Exhibition of Portraits’. *1900, EXPOSITION UNIVERSELLE, Paris, U.S. Pavilion *1901, January 5–19, C.W. KRAUSHAAR ART GALLERIES, 260 Fifth Avenue (between 28th & 29th Streets), New York (One Man Show) *1901,
PAN-AMERICAN EXPOSITION The Pan-American Exposition was a world's fair held in Buffalo, New York, United States, from May 1 through November 2, 1901. The fair occupied of land on the western edge of what is now Delaware Park–Front Park System, Delaware Park, extending ...
, Buffalo, New York. *1901, M. KNOEDLER & CO., New York. *1901–02, December 1, 1901 – June 1, 1902, SOUTH CAROLINA INTER-STATE AND WEST INDIAN EXPOSITION, Charleston, South Carolina. *1902, THE CORCORAN GALLERY OF ART, Washington D.C. *1902, NATIONAL ARTS CLUB, New York, 'Portraits and Ideal Heads'. *1903, January 5–19, NOE ART GALLERIES, 368, Fifth Avenue (between 34th & 35th Streets), New York. *1904, November 23 – December 3, M. KNOEDLER & CO., 355, Fifth Avenue (corner 34th Street), New York. (One Man Show) *1905, THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO, Portrait Exhibition *1906, December 3–15, M. KNOEDLER & CO., 355 5th Avenue (corner of 34th Street), New York (one man show). *1907, THE LOTOS CLUB, New York. *1907, PARIS SALON. *1908, THE LOTOS CLUB, New York. *1908, January 13–22, M. KNOEDLER & CO., 355 Fifth Avenue, (corner of 34th Street), New York (one man show). *1908, January 18 – February 9 – MINNEAPOLIS SOCIETY OF FINE ARTS, MINNEAPOLIS. *1908, Monday, January 27 – Friday, January 31, BENDANN’S ART STORE, BALTIMORE. *1908, Tuesday, February 4 – Wednesday, February 19, THE CORCORAN GALLERY OF ART, WASHINGTON D.C. (one man show). *1908, February 1908, McCLEES GALLERIES, 1411, Walnut Street, Philadelphia. *1910, March 22 – April 30, KÖNIGLICHE AKADEMIE DER KÜNSTE ZU BERLIN, ‘Ausstellung Amerikanischer Kunst’ (Hors Catalogue). *1910–11, December 21 – January 3, M. KNOEDLER & CO., 355 5th Avenue, New York (one man show). *1912, THE RALSTON GALLERIES, 567, Fifth Avenue, New York. *1913, March 31 – April 12, M. KNOEDLER & CO., 556-558 5th Avenue, New York (one man show). *1916, THE RALSTON GALLERIES, 567, 5th Avenue, New York. *1916, THE LOTOS CLUB, 110 West 57th Street, New York. *1917, HENRY REINHARDT & SON, 565, Fifth Avenue, New York. *1918, January 7–12, HENRY REINHARDT & SON, 565 Fifth Avenue, New York. *1918, February 23–26, THE LOTOS CLUB, 110 West 57th Street, New York. *1918, M. KNOEDLER & CO., 556, Fifth Avenue, New York. *1918, THE RALSTON GALLERY, 567, Fifth Avenue, New York. *1923, GUMP’S, San Francisco. *1925, April 6 – April 18, DUVEEN GALLERIES, 720 5th Avenue, New York (one man show). *1933, THE COWIE GALLERY, THE BILTMORE HOTEL, Los Angeles, California. *1937, April 20 – May 4, WILDENSTEIN & CO., INC., 19 East 64th Street, New York (one man show). *1943, May 5–19,
GRAND CENTRAL ART GALLERIES The Grand Central Art Galleries were the exhibition and administrative space of the nonprofit Painters and Sculptors Gallery Association, an artists' cooperative established in 1922 by Walter Leighton Clark together with John Singer Sargent, Edm ...
, New York, ‘Portraits of Yesterday and Today.’ *1944, March 7 – April 4, WILDENSTEIN GALLERY, New York, ‘Stars of Yesterday & Today’, Section: Contemporary Portraits by Contributing Artists. *1947, April 21 – May 3, FRENCH & COMPANY, 210 East 57th Street, New York (one man show). *1950, June 29 – November 19, NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART, Washington D.C., 'Makers of History in Washington 1800 – 1950'. *1968, NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART, Washington D.C., 'This New Man: A Discourse in Portraits'. *2000, NEWPORT ART MUSEUM, Rhode Island, 'Newportraits'. *2000–2003, GEORGE BUSH PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY AND MUSEUM, College Station, Texas (touring to six other US venues), 'Portraits of the Presidents: The National Portrait Gallery'.


Collections

The largest public collections of his works are: The Historisches Museum von Uri, Altdorf, Switzerland which has ten pictures, including a large allegorical work painted in 1888 called Alpenrose und Edelweiss, and portraits of his father and his uncle (all three donated by him in 1905 when the Museum was first opened). The Preservation Society of Newport County, Rhode Island, who were given six of the portraits and two etchings by Muller-Ury in the American Heritage Center at the University of Wyoming in Laramie in 2007 to add to the six they already possessed five of which are of the Havemeyer family (this collection included Governor Merriam of St Paul as well as his etchings of railroad builder James J. Hill and Senator
Chauncey Depew Chauncey Mitchell Depew (April 23, 1834April 5, 1928) was an American attorney, businessman, and Republican politician. He is best remembered for his two terms as United States Senator from New York and for his work for Cornelius Vanderbilt, a ...
and was donated to Wyoming by Nicholas M. Turner, husband of the soprano Jessica Dragonette, who at one time owned nearly forty pictures by the artist many bought at his studio sale in 1947). They also acquired from Wyoming the artist's hands modelled by Gertrude Colburn (died 1968). The National Portrait Gallery in Washington has nine portraits, including President William McKinley, General Henry Clarke Corbin, James J. Hill, the two etchings of James J. Hill and Chauncey Depew, and two oils that the American Heritage Center at the University of Wyoming in Laramie gave them in 2007 from the Dragonette Collection: a Self-portrait and a portrait of steel titan Charles M. Schwab. In 2009 they acquired a drawing of Anaconda Copper Mining Millionaire
Marcus Daly Marcus Daly (December 5, – November 12, 1900) was an Irish-born American businessman known as one of the four Copper Kings of Butte, Montana, United States. Early life Daly emigrated from County Cavan, Ireland, to the United States as a youn ...
. The New York State Museum at Albany contains six portraits, five of which were in the former New York Chamber of Commerce: Theodore Havemeyer, Oswald Ottendorfer, James Constable, William 'Boyce' Thompson, and Benjamin Altman. Much of his work remains in private collections or with the descendants of his sitters, and many of the portraits of his most famous sitters are apparently lost. However, his recently rediscovered 1923 portrait of his great friend Sir Joseph Duveen, the art dealer, has been recently widely reproduced, notably on the cover of the 2004 biography of Duveen by Meryle Secrest; it was subsequently sold at TEFAF Maastricht in 2006 for $95,000.


Hildegarde Muller-Uri

Hildegarde Muller-Uri (born 1894, Greenwich Village, New York City – died 1990) – actually born Hildegarde Petronella Bernhardina Muller – an American visual artist, was a relative, and in fact a third cousin, of Müller-Ury. She was the eldest daughter of amateur artist Henry Muller and his wife Wilhelmina, both of whom were of course natives of Canton Uri in Switzerland. Henry Muller had moved from New York to San Augustine in around 1898 to work as a chef in one of Henry Flagler's hotels, and later became to builder and owner of the Hotel Marion at 128 Bay Street. She studied first with Hugh H. Breckinridge (1870–1937) at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and at the Breckenridge Art School in East Gloucester, Massachusetts, between 1925 and 1930, and later at the Art Students League with Frank Vincent Dumond (1865–1951) and possibly with Olinsky, Lewis, and others. She exhibited at the Society of Independent Artists 1929 to 1931. She founded and directed the Galleon Art School in San Augustine in 1925, but this was more a club for artists than a school, so by 1931 she founded the San Augustine Arts Club, where she proved herself a capable arts administrator; she was producing much art of her own in these years and by May 1933 she was able to exhibit a large number of her impressionist paintings, woodcuts of San Augustine, and etchings, at the Woman's Club of Charlotte, North Carolina, in May 1933. By 1937 she had become interested in portraiture and studied again with Wayman Adams (1883–1959) and at some point with his teacher Jossey Bilan. She served as president of the San Augustine Art Association in 1947–1948, and was to be president and treasurer of the Florida Association of Art. Her parents were major patrons of the Arts Club and, in fact, assisted the club by selling them land they owned bordering Marine, Charlotte and Cadiz Streets at a below-market price. They then loaned the Arts Club the money to erect a building, essentially designed by Hildegarde Muller-Uri and her father, which was completed in 1954. Muller-Uri's work includes stained glass, etchings, illustrations, woodblock prints and linoleum cuts of city scenes and historic buildings in Florida. In 1955 she was working on a book with twenty-two woodcuts called ''St. Augustine in Woodcuts''. She died in 1990 and was buried in Evergreen Cemetery. Several of her works have been sold at auction, including ''St. Augustine Street Scene depicting a Black Woman Outside a St. Augustine House'' (sold 2013).Hildegarde Muller-Uri brief description
mutualart.com; accessed March 23, 2015.


References


Bibliography

* * *


Further reading

* Lyman Horace Weeks, ''Prominent Families of New York, being an account in biographical form of individuals and families distinguished as representatives of the social, professional and civic life of New York City'' (1897), p. 422. * Mitchell C. Harrison (compiler), ''New York State's Prominent and Progressive Men: An Encyclopaedia of Contemporaneous Biography'', Volume 3, New York, 1902, p. 243. * S.E.L. (Leisha), "A Successful Portrait Painter", ''Town & Country'', New York, August 22, 1903, pp. 19–21. * Jerry Cotter, "Müller-Ury: Portraitist", ''The Sign'', Volume 27, No. 1, August 1947. * Geraldine Norman, "The Artist Time Forgot", ''The Independent'', London, December 16, 1989.


External links


Adolfo Müller-Ury exhibition catalogs
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Muller-Ury, Adolfo 1862 births 1947 deaths 19th-century Swiss painters 19th-century American male artists Swiss male painters 20th-century Swiss painters 20th-century American male artists 19th-century American painters American male painters 20th-century American painters Swiss emigrants to the United States Swiss portrait painters American portrait painters Swiss Roman Catholics American Roman Catholics Knights of St. Gregory the Great Papal counts Swiss nobility Academy of Fine Arts, Munich alumni People from Airolo Burials at Calvary Cemetery (Queens)