Miss Anna Alma-Tadema

Miss Anna Alma-Tadema (1883) is a portrait of the artist's daughter Anna (1867–1943), who herself became a significant artist and writer, producing paintings in the Arts and Crafts tradition and eventually a biography of her father. Alma-Tadema painted Anna and her sister Laurence several times over the years, creating a series of family portraits that document their growth within the family's artistic milieu. The Royal Academy of Arts holds this canvas, perhaps exhibited there at the time of its creation—a public statement of paternal pride and artistic skill combined. Anna would have been approximately sixteen when this portrait was made, placing it at the threshold between childhood and young womanhood. The portrait documents not only a family relationship but the cultural milieu of a Victorian artistic household where creativity was embedded in daily life.

Oil on canvas with the careful attention to an individual sitter's character that distinguishes family portraiture from more formal or public commissions. Alma-Tadema's technique brings the same material sensitivity to contemporary dress and domestic setting as to his historical subjects, without the archaeological distancing mechanism.