Alma-Tadema met his second wife, Laura, when she was only seventeen years old, and he apparently fell in love with her at first sight. Although he used the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War as a pretence to move to England, it is thought that he actually moved to London to be closer to Laura. Upon his arrival, he contracted with Laura for private art lessons, and thereafter asked her to marry him. Although her father originally refused, due to their age difference (she was 18, he was 34), he eventually relented on the condition that the two got to know each other first. Apparently the match was good, as they stayed married for the rest of their lives. Alma-Tadema used his wife, Laura Therese Alma-Tadema, who was a painter in her own right, as a model in many of his paintings, The Women of Amphissa of which is the most prominent example.
The Women of Amphissa
oil on canvas • 182.8 x 121.8 cm
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Lawrence Alma-Tadema