Portrait of the Artist’s Sister (Effie Stillman)

Lisa Stillman was the daughter of William J. Stillman (1828-1901), an American diplomat and journalist. After her mother died, she was raised by her father’s second wife, Marie Spartali (1844-1927), the Pre-Raphaelite painter, model, and muse. Stillman grew up in London, Florence, and Rome. She was connected to many leading art and literary figures in Europe and the United States, with a career spanning Pre-Raphaelitism to the Arts and Crafts movement of the Bloomsbury group. Stillman studied at the Slade School of Fine Art in London and at the French Academy in Rome; she was also tutored by British painter George Frederick Watts. She exhibited her drawings and paintings in New York and London, where they received critical acclaim for their delicacy and beauty. This striking portrait demonstrates Stillman’s considerable artistic skills and refined technique, which were highly praised in her lifetime. The subject of this striking portrait may be the artist’s half-sister, sculptor Effie Stillman (1872-1911).