Portrait of the artist's wife

During their life together Michael Ancher painted numerous portraits of his wife the artist Anna Ancher, many of the portraits has an intimate character. This painting has a different more formal and even official character. It is a study for a portrait of Anna Ancher commissioned by the committee for the Danish equivalent of the Salon – the annual Charlottenborg Spring Exhibition. In the painting, Anna Ancher is represented wearing an artist smock as a great artist on the height of her career.