SIR LAWRENCE ALMA-TADEMA, O.M., R.A. | Portraits of Laura and Anna Alma-Tadema

Given by the artist to the artist John Collier, London c.1884 with whom it remained until his death in 1934 when inherited by his son Lawrence Collier, Limpsfield, Surrey and with him until his death in 1977 and inherited by his son William Collier;

Ewbank's, Woking, Surrey, 22 September 2016, lot 1922, where purchased by the present owner

Vern G. Swanson, The Biography and Catalogue Raisonnee of the Paintings of Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, 1990, p.223, illustrated p.418

This sketch records an interesting friendship between two artists Alma-Tadema and John Collier, son of Lord Monkswell who had commissioned one of Alma-Tadema's most remarkable pictures, The Sculptor's Model (sold in these rooms, 17 December 2015, lot 15). John became Alma-Tadema's studio assistant and eventually a noted portrait painter with a side-line in eroticism with pictures like Lilith, Clytemnestra, Tannhauser in the Venusberg and Lady Godiva. According to Vern Swanson; 'The handkerchief depicts half-length figures of Alma-Tadema's wife and daughter Anna, dressed in Roman costume, holding hands. Alma-Tadema painted on a silk handkerchief which had been accidentally left behind by John Collier at the artist's studio at 17 Grove End Road, at about the time when Collier was painting his portrait of Alma-Tadema [c.1884].' (Vern G. Swanson, The Biography and Catalogue Raisonnee of the Paintings of Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, 1990, p.223)