Lourens Alma Tadema artwork • watercolour • drawing • previously for sale The kiss welcome

Sir Lawrence Alma Tadema, the famous painter of the British fin-de-siècle period, was Frisian by birth. Lourens Tadema - Alma was his middle name - was trained in Antwerp by the history painter Henri Leys. He celebrated his greatest triumphs after 1870 in England, where his perfectly executed genre performances, set in ancient Rome and Greece, matched the taste of the Victorian upper class. For the decor in which he placed his scenes, Tadema made use of contemporary publications on classical antiquity and studied archaeological objects in the collection of the British Museum in London. His watercolor technique was extremely refined. He first drew precise contours and then applied many layers of watercolor to achieve the effect of oil paint. In Holland, where his elaborately edited watercolors contrasted strongly with the transparent landscapes of the painters of the Hague School, the painter could not count on much admiration. At the request of his cousin Hendrik Willem Mesdag, he did take part several times in exhibitions of the Hollandsche Teekenmaatschappij in The Hague, including with this watercolor.