Anna Alma-Tadema

Anna Alma-Tadema (née Tadema; 16 May 1867 – 5 July 1943) was a British artist and suffragette.

Anna Alma-Tadema
Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, Anna Alma Tadema, oil on canvas, 1883, Royal Academy of Arts[lower-alpha 1]
Born
Anna Tadema

(1867-05-16)16 May 1867
Brussels, Belgium
Died5 July 1943(1943-07-05) (aged 76)
London
NationalityBritish
Known forPainting, drawing

Alma-Tadema primarily worked with drawings and paintings, creating many portraits and representations of interior scenes, flowers and buildings. She was influenced by her father, Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, and showed her works at exhibitions with him and her step-mother, Laura Theresa Alma-Tadema. Her work was shown at national exhibitions, including the Royal Academy of Arts and the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago.

Anna Alma-Tadema was recognized for her achievements as an artist at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago and the 1889 Paris Exhibition.

Early life

Anna Tadema was the second daughter of Dutch painter Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema and his French wife, Marie-Pauline Gressin-Dumoulin de Boisgirard,[2][3] who lived in Brussels.[3] Her older sister, Laurense, was born in 1865. The girls' mother died in 1869.[2] Lawrence and his daughters then moved to England.[3] Her father married for the second time to Laura Epps in 1871, when Anna was four years old.[2]

Anna Alma-Tadema was raised in London with her family. Laurense received her education at home and it is believed that Anna was home-schooled as well.[2] Anna appears at least twice in paintings by her father. In 1873, she and her sister were depicted in This is Our Corner, and then in 1883, her father painted her portrait.

Anna's mother, father and step-mother were painters, and as a result, she was raised in a very artistic household.[4]

Sir Lawrence was inspired by words from antiquity and developed a style that was emulated by Laura, Anna and other artists. Once he died, the popularity of his works and style waned for about six decades.[5] Anna's sister, Laurense, was a poet, painter, novelist, critic, playwright, and short story author.[4]

Anna Alma-Tadema, portrait photograph
Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, This is Our Corner, also known as Laurense and Anna Alma-Tadema (1873; Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam).

Work as an artist

Anna Alma-Tadema was described by biographer Helen Zimmern as a "delicate, dainty artist who has inherited so much of her father's power for reproducing detail."[6] During her time as an artist, Anna Alma-Tadema created several portraits, representations of flowers,[7] as well as watercolor depictions of house interiors and buildings.[8] One such example of Alma-Tadema's portraits is Miss Tessa Gosse. This and other works, such as The Misty Valley and The Gold Room, were shown at the Royal Academy of Arts.[2]

She made watercolours of the interior of the Alma-Tadema family house, Townshend House in Tichfield Terrace, near Regent's Park in London.[9] The family home was extravagantly decorated by her father to resemble a Roman villa.[5][8] The Drawing Room, which Alma-Tadema painted when she was a teenager,[10] was exhibited in 1893 at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago.[11] Additionally, in 1885, she painted The Gold Room, which also represented the interior of the family home.[10]

A picture of the actress Gladys Cooper as a girl which Alma-Tadema made (medium unknown) appeared on the front page of Tatler in 1915. [12]

Alma-Tadema exhibited her works in England for approximately forty years, between 1885 and 1928.[2] Alma-Tadema showed fifteen works at the Royal Academy between 1885 and 1928, including The Gold Room, Miss Tessa Gosse, The Misty Valley,[2] and The Idler's Harvest.[13] Although she resided in London, Anna Alma-Tadema also exhibited works abroad. In 1889, she won a medal at an exhibition in Paris.[5] Additionally, Anna, her father, and her stepmother, Laura, all exhibited and won prizes at the World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago in 1893.[14]

Anna Alma-Tadema's works continue to be exhibited today. For example, the artist's works were included within the April 2011 Victoria and Albert Museum's exhibition, The Cult of Beauty: The Aesthetic Movement 1860–1900 in London.[15]

Selected works
Anna Alma-Tadema, The Drawing Room, Townshend House (1885; Royal Academy of Arts, London)
Anna Alma-Tadema, Eton College Chapel (1886; Private collection)
Anna Alma-Tadema, Self-Portrait (Private collection)

Personal life

Alma-Tadema was committed to women's suffrage and signed the Some Supporters of the Women's Suffrage Movement in 1897.[16]

Neither Anna Alma-Tadema or her sister ever married. They did not enjoy successful careers in their later years.[2]

Notes
  1. The portrait of Anna Alma-Tadema by her father is on the cover of The Awkward Age in Women's Popular Fiction, 1850–1900.[1]

References
  1. Sarah Bilston (22 July 2004). The Awkward Age in Women's Popular Fiction, 1850–1900 : Girls and the Transition to Womanhood: Girls and the Transition to Womanhood. OUP Oxford. pp. Front cover, back cover. ISBN 978-0-19-155676-0.
  2. Sara Gray (2009). The Dictionary of British Women Artists. Casemate Publishers. pp. 17–18. ISBN 978-0-7188-3084-7.
  3. The Intelligence: A Semi-monthly Journal of Education. E.O. Vaile. 1900. p. 172.
  4. The Lady's Realm. Hutchinson. 1898. p. 34.
  5. Ian Chilvers (2009). The Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists. Oxford University Press. p. 14. ISBN 978-0-19-953294-0.
  6. Helen Zimmern (1902). Sir Lawrence Alma Tadema, R.A. G. Bell & Sons. p. 8.
  7. Ray Desmond (25 February 1994). Dictionary of British And Irish Botantists And Horticulturalists Including plant collectors, flower painters and garden designers. CRC Press. p. 13. ISBN 978-0-85066-843-8.
  8. Ellen Gosse (1894). "Laurens Alma-Tadema". The Century. Vol. XLVII. Century Company. pp. 484–497.
  9. Elree I. Harris; Shirley R. Scott (26 November 2013). A Gallery of Her Own: An Annotated Bibliography of Women in Victorian Painting. Routledge. pp. 53, 245, 248. ISBN 978-1-135-49434-6.
  10. "The Drawing Room, Townshend House, 10th September 1885". Collections. Royal Academy of Arts. Retrieved 21 November 2014.
  11. Halsey Cooley Ives (1893). World's Columbian Exposition, 1893: Official Catalogue. Part X. Department K. Fine Arts. W.B. Conkey. p. 139.
  12. 14 April 1915
  13. Royal Academy of Arts (Great Britain); Henry Blackburn (1898). Academy Notes. Chatto and Windus. p. 25.
  14. Journal of the Society of Arts. Society of Arts. 1894. pp. 444, 602.
  15. "Artist of the Month – March 2011: Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema RA (1836–1912)". Collections. Royal Academy of Arts. Retrieved 21 November 2014.
  16. Deborah Cherry (12 November 2012). Beyond the Frame: Feminism and Visual Culture, Britain 1850 -1900. Routledge. p. 144. ISBN 978-1-135-09483-6.

Further reading
  • Charlotte Gere, Artistic Circles: Design and Decoration in the Aesthetic Movement (London: V & A Publishing, 2010).
  • Susie Beckham, 'Recovering Anna Alma-Tadema (1867–1943)', British Art Journal, XXII (3), 2021–22, pp. 32–43.

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