page_title: Sophie Gengembre Anderson
section_title: Europe
hierarchical_section_title: Sophie Gengembre Anderson / Europe
caption_attribution_description: This painting is based on a poem by Lord Tennyson. It tells the tale of Elaine, an innocent country girl who falls in love with Sir Lancelot. He abandons her in favour of Queen Guinevere and she dies from unrequited love. Anderson’s picture depicts a servant rowing Elaine’s body to King Arthur’s palace at Camelot. Anderson was born in Paris and studied there under the Russian artist Baron Charles de Steuben. Her art education was cut short when her family moved to America in 1848. From then on she was self-taught. In 1871 Liverpool held its first Autumn Exhibition. 'Elaine' was purchased for the town and became the first work by a female artist to enter the Walker Art Gallery collection. This remarkable acquisition indicates the forward-thinking attitude of the first purchase committee.
context_page_description: Sophie Gengembre Anderson was a French-born British artist who specialised in genre painting of children and women, typically in rural settings. She began her career as a lithographer and painter of portraits, collaborating with Walter Anderson on portraits of American Episcopal bishops. Her work, Elaine, was the first public collection purchase of a woman artist. Her painting No Walk Today was purchased for more than £1 million.
context_section_description: In 1854 the Andersons moved to London, where Sophie exhibited a still life of fruit, vegetables, game, and fish entitled An American Market Basket at the Society of British Artists by 1855. It was considered an "admirable composition" made with "surprising truth". Her genre pieces were also exhibited at the Royal Academy. They returned to Pennsylvania in 1858 for a long visit with her family, during which time she exhibited at the Pittsburgh Artist's Association in 1859 and 1860. The latter year she and her husband had work shown at the National Academy of Design. She then settled in London again around 1863.
  Anderson's work was widely exhibited at venues including the Royal Academy, the Royal Society of British Artists (RBA), and the British Institution. Her work, Elaine, was the first public collection purchase of a woman artist. The Marquis de Murrieta contributed the painting A Fairy Messenger to a mixed charity exhibition in 1871.
  Her oil painting Foundling Girls at Prayer in the Chapel (mid-c19th – late-c19th) is displayed at the Foundling Museum; correlating well with  Anderson's typical genre painting of children and women and the Museum's focus. The painting depicts the varying ages of the foundling girls, what they wore, and references the religious aspects of their life.
  To manage her health issue, the couple moved to the Isle of Capri in 1871, where they lived, painted, and entertained society in a house with a large garden called Villa Castello. Capri was an artist colony at that time, its residents included Frederic Leighton, Walter McLaren, John Singer Sargent, Edouard Alexandre Sain, and Jean Benner. She exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery between 1878 and 1887.  Anderson made Italian genre and Neoclassical paintings, including paintings of peasant women and children. At a time when it was difficult for women to have a successful artistic career, these paintings, generally made by men, allowed for her to have a successful career.
caption: Elaine (1870)
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