Portrait of Julia Marlowe. [Inscribed by Marlow to a Friend, 1940]

New York: Arnold Genthe, 1920. Silver gelatin print, 6 ¾ x 9 ¼ inches on larger mount. Signed by Genthe on the mount, inscribed by Marlowe as Marlowe Sothern on the mount as follows: "To Jean: our little comrade on our walks in Beautiful Stockbridge. In remembrance also of 'Sun Yat Sen' and Choo-Chio Chow. September. 1940. Julia Marlowe Sothern. Very Good. An uncommon image of the actress, feminist and suffrage advocate Julia Marlowe, who adopted the name - though never legally - Julia Marlowe Sothern after working with the Shakespearean actor E.H. Sothern. Ill health led Marlowe to retire from the stage in 1924 and she was seldom seen in public. This photograph, inscribed later in her life, is an uncommon relic from her reclusive later years. We can find no record of a Jean or the names mentioned.

Arnold Genthe, who famously photographed the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906 from the site of his destroyed studio, moved to New York in 1911, where he became a portrait photographer. He most likely took this picture in his stint on the east coast. We find no other record of this specific portrait of Marlowe. Some silvering at margins, otherwise excellent, with some light normal tanning to mount.