Euphemia Lamb

Euphemia Lamb
Euphemia by Ambrose McEvoy, oil on canvas, 1909, Tate Gallery.
Born	Nina Forrest c. 1889
Died	1957
Nationality	English
Known for	Artist's model

Euphemia Lamb (c.1889–1957), born Nina Forrest (some sources, as well as publicly available records, alongside giving her first name as 'Anne', indicate her middle name was actually Euphemia, casting doubt on the tentative claim that Henry Lamb perceived in her a likeness to Saint Euphemia) was an artists' model and the wife of Henry Lamb. She modelled for Augustus John and Jacob Epstein and came to exemplify the sexual freedom of the bohemian lifestyle of the early twentieth century. Henry Lamb renamed her Euphemia, by which name she was generally known. John Maynard Keynes commented that Euphemia had more of a sex life "than the rest of us put together". She was one of the lovers of the occultist Aleister Crowley.

Nina's father was Arthur Forrest. Nina claimed that she was born on a steamship bound for Bombay, but there is no independent verification of this. She was raised in Greenheys, a poor district of Manchester known as a centre for prostitution. Her working class accent, however, was not to everyone's taste, and Viva King, another Bohemian, said of one of Jacob Epstein's busts of Euphemia, "I fancy I can hear, through the open mouth, her ugly voice".

Nina Forrest met Henry Lamb in 1905 in Manchester, where he was at medical school. They left for London as soon as they could. Henry enrolled in the Chelsea School of Art and they attended the Friday Club run by Vanessa Stephen. Supposedly, Henry renamed Nina ″Euphemia″ because she reminded him of Saint Euphemia in the painting by Andrea Mantegna They married in May 1906 after she became pregnant, but she lost the baby due to a miscarriage.

Euphemia was one of the models who networked at the Café Royal before the First World War, occupying a grey area between professional model and prostitute. Her contemporaries included Betty May, Dolores, and Lilian Shelley, along with many other young women. She was slim, pale, and fair-haired and apparently able to adopt any pose that might be asked of her. Her husky voice and slightly androgynous appearance meant that she could pass for a young man, which she sometimes did. Augustus John commented to Henry Lamb, "she makes an irresistible boy".