Early Life, Family and Training Born in Yorkshire in 1676, Sarah Hoadly entered a world where her talent for capturing faces would eventually define her life's work. Before she became a wife and mother, she was a woman building a reputation as a British portrait painter. Her path into the arts was shaped by the guidance of Mary Beale, a woman who served as her pupilage mentor and helped her find her footing in the professional art world. Her professional life and her personal life became closely intertwined through her art. While working as a painter, she met one of her sitters, Benjamin Ho…