10 things to know about Geesje and Anna

Geesje Kwak – and sometimes her sister Anna - dazzles as the model in no fewer than 13 paintings by George Hendrik Breitner, She is the young woman enveloped in a Japanese kimono in a dreamy or sensual pose. We know who she is because from 1893 to 1896 Breitner photographed, drew and painted her countless times. The paintings she posed for – from the Girls in Kimono series – are now the artist’s best-loved works.

Geesje and Anna were born into a working-class family – their father Jan was a boatsman on the Zaan river, north of Amsterdam. In 1880 the entire Kwak family – including mother Willemptje Posch, brother Arend and the two other sisters Niesje and Aafje – moved to the capital.

We have always known that Geesje Kwak was an Amsterdammer, and that she was aged 16 when she posed for Breitner. But no one had any idea what she really looked like until 1961, when the sensational discovery was made of a case filled with photographs by Breitner that included portraits of Geesje.

Geesje worked in Amsterdam as a housemaid, while Anna ironed and sewed. Having domestic staff was a status symbol in the late 19th century. Anyone who could afford it wanted household help, and demand far exceeded supply. This meant that, as a housemaid, Geesje would have been able to find plenty of work to contribute to the family income.

Two years after posing for Breitner, Geesje and her younger sister Niesje left the Netherlands for South Africa, with Aafje following later. They found themselves in the middle of the fierce Second Boer War. Their ultimate destination was Pretoria, but we do not know exactly what they did there. Uneducated women would have found it difficult to find anything other than domestic work for Dutch people living there. It is therefore likely that Geesje and Niesje went to South Africa to join household staff.

The social status of the two young women would have been quite different from in the Netherlands. In South Africa they automatically belonged to the most privileged classes, simply because of their skin colour and country of birth. The original inhabitants, however, had no civil rights at all in what was now the South African Republic – they were continually maltreated and humiliated. So Geesje and Niesje found themselves in an undefined space: between their employers’ sense of supremacy and the servility of oppressed local domestic workers. This gave rise to a new social class comprising so-called witmeisies, or ‘whitemaids’.

Four years after sitting for Breitner’s photographic portraits, the now 20-year-old Geesje posed again, along with her sister Niesje – this time for photographer Joseph Munro. His portrait of them appeared at an exhibition in Grahamstown. Following Niesje’s death the local newspaper referred to this event: ‘Although not sturdily built, the two young sisters looked in such a way that in 1897 a well-known photographer took a portrait of the two girls to typify Dutch beauty and freshness.’

In autumn 1899, Geesje was taken to Pretoria’s Volkshospitaal with tuberculosis. On 30 November she succumbed to her illness, bringing to an end her short life. Geesje was just 22. The news was probably received in the Netherlands much later, because it wasn’t until 11 January the following year that the announcement of her death was published.

Anna’s husband Jan moved to the United States in 1907 – Anna followed on a month later with her foster child Antonia. In the aftermath of the April 1906 San Francisco earthquake she responded to an appeal for volunteer relief workers. The family settled in the nearby city of Oakland. Jan and Anna embraced American life, and went by the names John and Annie.

Anna adopted Antonia from a home because she was unable to have her own children. When Antonia turned 16, Anna wanted her to bring money into the house. But instead Antonia secretly enrolled at a university to study music. This didn’t go down well with Anna, who sent her away. Antonia would never return home. Despite facing many obstacles, she made a success of her life: she became the first female orchestral conductor in the United States.