Bondi, Lea

Lea Bondi,
natal chart (Placidus)
natal chart English style (Equal houses)
natal chart with Whole Sign houses

Name	Bondi, Lea Gender: F
born on	12 December 1880 at 19:00 (= 7:00 PM )
Place	Mainz, Germany, 50n01, 8e16
Timezone	LMT m8e16 (is local mean time)
Data source	BC/BR in hand Rodden Rating AA Collector: Scholfield
Astrology data	21°11' 08°24 Asc. 00°27'

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Lea Bondi (Egon Schiele's 1912 "Portrait of Wally Neuzil")

Biography

Austrian-British-Jewish art dealer and collector who was forced to emigrate to Great Britain due to Nazi persecution after the annexation of Austria to the Nazi German Reich. The Würthle Gallery, which she ran, was "Aryanized" by Nazis and her art collection, including the 1912 oil painting Porträt von Wally (Portrait of Wally) by Egon Schiele, extorted.

Lea Bondi was born into a German-Jewish merchant family in Mainz who moved to Vienna in the mid-1880s. She had 16 siblings, eight brothers and eight sisters.

On 6 June 1919, Lea Bondi was entered in the Vienna Commercial Register as authorized signatory of the Würthle & Sohn Successor, known as Kunsthandlung Würthle or later as Galerie Würthle. In the following year the business was expanded and Verlag Neuer Graphik added to the name. On 22 June 1920, Otto Nirenstein (1894–1978), who later became known as Otto Kallir, also received individual procuration. The expanded company published contemporary and modern original graphics from Austria by artists such as Faistauer, Itten, Jungnickel, Kubin and Schiele. Nirenstein's power of attorney was canceled on 26 May 1922. Bondi became an open partner in the company. In 1926, the owners Leopoldine and Ulf Seidl (1881–1960) resigned; on 13 August 1926, Bondi became the sole owner of the art dealership.

In 1936 she married the sculptor Alexander Sándor Járay (1870–1943) from Temešvár, after his first wife died, becoming known as Lea Jaray or Lea Bondi-Jaray.

There are no original sources about the Aryanization of the Würthle Gallery by the Salzburg art dealer Friedrich Welz, because – as emerged on the occasion of allegations of fraud against Welz in 1943 – according to Welz, “no written contract was concluded [...] – only in its place a log that Welz keeps at the disposal of the tax office." Following the Aryanization of the Würthle gallery, Friedrich Welz visited Bondi-Jaray in her home at Weißgerberlände 38, on the Danube Canal the day before the planned departure for London, 17 March 1939. Schiele's Portrait of Wally hung on the wall. Welz immediately recognized the value of the painting and demanded it, as well as a piece of furniture. Lea Bondi-Jaray made it clear that it had been her private property for many years and that the picture neither belonged to Galerie Würthle nor was it for sale. Welz insisted until Bondi-Jaray's husband told her not to risk the planned escape. According to court filings, he told her she should not resist Welz, because "you know what he [Welz] can do.'"

In 1939 Bondi-Jaray fled to London with her husband. She could only take with her what she could carry, including a number of drawings, and certainly some sheets by Egon Schiele. She lived in Hampstead and dealt in works by Austrian emigrés. Her husband died in London on 5 July 1943. In the same year, she and Otto Brill, who had also managed to escape to London, took over St. George’s Gallery at 81 Grosvenor Street in Mayfair.

In addition to graphics, there were new and used books to buy on all areas of art, theatre and music. The gallery quickly became a point of contact for German-speaking emigrants and gave some of them work, for example Erica Brausen and Harry Fischer, who later both founded well-known galleries in London. Lea Jaray presented contemporary artists of various styles, including Massimo Campigli, Lucian Freud, Alberto Giacometti, Oskar Kokoschka, André Masson, Ceri Richards and others. She was one of the first to show expressionist works in London, an area in which she had a high level of expertise. In 1947 the gallery was sponsored by the British Council for exhibitions of British and French artists of the new generation.

Lea Jaray became a British citizen in April 1948. In 1950 she showed her Contemporary Austrian Painters gallery in cooperation with the Albertina and the Federal Ministry for Education, which is responsible for culture. After that, the gallery was closed due to lack of profitability.

From 1945 onwards, Luise Kremlacek became acting head of the gallery. After a decision by the Austrian Restitution Commission on 17 March 1948, Friedrich Welz had to make restitution to the "Galerie Würthle" and Lea Bondi-Jaray. Welz then claimed expenses for the gallery. A second hearing was decided in favour of Welz, the "Aryanizer". To get their company back, Bondi-Jaray had to pay him 9,000 shillings. The gallery's collection, including 47 works of art by Anton Kolig, as well as the Schiele painting “Wally” from 1912, whose legal owner was Lea Bondi-Jaray, were declared lost.

However, when she asked, Welz reported that Schiele's painting had been confiscated along with other works of art and was in the Belvedere's collections. Lea Bondi-Jaray tried to recover the painting until her death. She died in London on 15 February 1969 at age 88 without receiving it or receiving any compensation.

A documentary film was made about the case in 2012. The film presented the history of the artwork and the positive impact that Lea Bondi's struggle to recover it had on restitution efforts for Nazi looted art.

Link to Wikipedia biography

Relationships

• compare to chart of Schiele, Egon (born 12 June 1890)

Events

• Work : Begin Major Project 6 June 1919 (Art gallery co-owner)
  chart Placidus Equal_H.

• Relationship : Marriage 1936 (Alexander Sándor Járay)

• Death of Mate 5 July 1943 (Alexander Sándor Járay)
  chart Placidus Equal_H.

• Social : Acquired Citizenship April 1948 (British)
  chart Placidus Equal_H.

• Death, Cause unspecified 15 February 1969 (Age 88)
  chart Placidus Equal_H.

Source Notes

Civil registry birth entry in hand from Sy Scholfield, copy on file.

Categories

• Family : Childhood : Family large (She had eight brothers and eight sisters)

• Family : Relationship : Widowed (1943)

• Lifestyle : Financial : Invest/ Collectibles (Art)

• Lifestyle : Home : Expatriate (London, England)

• Passions : Criminal Victim : Financial crime victim (Nazis looted her business and art collection)

• Personal : Death : Long life more than 80 yrs (Age 88)

• Vocation : Art : Other Art (Dealer)

• Vocation : Business/Marketing : Sales (Art dealer)

• Vocation : Writers : Publisher/ Editor (Art books)