Laura Theresa Alma-Tadema was an English painter specialising in domestic and genre scenes of women and children.
Background
A daughter of Doctor George Napoleon Epps (who was brother of Doctor John Epps), she had two sisters who were also painters (Emily studied under John Brett, a Pre-Raphaelite, and Ellen under Ford Madox Brown), while Edmund Gosse and Rowland Hill were her brothers-in-law.
Career
She was, from 1871, the second wife of the painter Lawrence Alma-Tadema. lieutenant was at Madox Brown"s home that Alma-Tadema first met her in December 1869, when she was aged 17 and he 33. As he was then thirty-four and Laura was now only eighteen, her father was initially opposed to the idea.
Doctor Epps finally agreed on the condition that they should wait until they knew each other better.
The Paris Salon in 1873 gave Laura her first success in painting, and in 1878, at the Paris International Exhibition, she was one of only two English women artists exhibited. Her other venues included the Royal Academy (from 1873), the Grosvenor Gallery and others in London.
She also had occasional work as an illustrator, particularly for the English Illustrated Magazine, and was well known as a hostess in their London residences at Regents Park and later Grove End Road. A memorial exhibition of her work was held at the Fine Art Society in 1910.