Sidney Brown (art collector)

Sidney William Brown (March 7, 1865, Winterthur — August 1, 1941, Baden) was a Swiss machine designer and art collector.

Life and work
Sidney Brown was born as one of six children of the British inventor Charles Brown and his wife Eugénie Pfau, who came from Winterthur. His older brother was the machine designer Charles Eugene Lancelot Brown. Like his brother, Sidney Brown studied mechanical engineering at the Winterthur Technical College and was one of the founding members of the Winterthur Velocipede Club during this time, of which he was the first president. After his studies, he then joined his father in 1884 at what was to become Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon. After his brother founded the company Brown, Boveri & Cie. together with Walter Boveri in 1891, Sidney Brown became technical director there and later a member of the board of directors.

In 1896 Brown married the industrialist's daughter Jenny Sulzer. Their honeymoon took the couple to Paris, where they acquired Eugène Boudin's painting Laundresses.

Art collection
Their collection initially focused on painters of the Munich School such as Ludwig Herterich, Leo Putz and Franz von Stuck. Their villa Langmatt, built in Baden in 1901, received its own gallery extension for the painting collection in 1906. Until WWII, the Brown couple, advised by the painter Carl Montag, acquired paintings by the French Impressionists in Paris. The collection included paintings by Paul Cézanne, Paul Gauguin, Camille Pissarro, and Pierre-Auguste Renoir. They also acquired valuable furniture, porcelain, clocks, silver, and books. After the death of their son John A. Brown in 1987, the villa and its collections were placed in a foundation and have been open as a museum since 1990. Brown was buried in the family grave at Liebenfels cemetery in Baden AG.

2023 sale of Cézannes
In 2023 the Foundation sold three artworks by Cézanne at Christies. One of the Cézannes, entitled Fruits et pot de gingembre, was found to have been owned by a Jewish art collector who was persecuted by the Nazis. A confidential settlement was reached with the family of Jacob Goldschmidt shortly before the sale. However questions about the exact itinerary of the artwork remained

Honors

 * 1916 Ehrenbürger von Baden
 * 1930 Ehrendoktor der ETH Zürich

Literature

 * Norbert Lang: Charles E. L. Brown und Walter Boveri. Gründer eines Weltunternehmens. Verein für wirtschaftshistorische Studien, 1992, ISBN 3909059015.
 * Florens Deuchler: Die französischen Impressionisten und ihre Vorläufer. Katalog Langmatt, 1990, ISBN 3855450447.
 * Eva-Maria Preiswerk-Lösel: Ein Haus für die Impressionisten – Das Museum Langmatt. Hatje Cantz Verlag, 2001, ISBN 3775710175.
 * Meet the Browns. Badener Neujahrsblätter 2012. Herausgegeben von der Literarischen Gesellschaft Baden und der Vereinigung für Heimatkunde des Bezirks Baden. Hier + Jetzt, Verlag für Kultur und Geschichte, Baden 2011.
 * Meet the Browns. Badener Neujahrsblätter 2012. Herausgegeben von der Literarischen Gesellschaft Baden und der Vereinigung für Heimatkunde des Bezirks Baden. Hier + Jetzt, Verlag für Kultur und Geschichte, Baden 2011.