Brita Barnekow especially painted portraits, landscapes, and genre pictures. In the present work, she deals with a classic motif - the woman in an interior gazing out the window.

Brita Barnekow was a student of the painters Marie Vilhelmine Bang (in 1883–85) and Frants Henningsen (in 1885–87). In the years 1889–93, she studied at the newly established Academy of Fine Arts’ School of Art for Women (Kunstakademiets Kunstskole for Kvinder), from which she did not pass, but received praise and a scholarship. She later traveled to Paris, where she studied at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. She also travelled to London and Italy. Barnekow exhibited for many years at the Spring Exhibition at Charlottenborg and several times at the Artists’ Autumn Exhibition, and she also participated in the Women’s Exhibition (Kvindernes Udstilling fra Fortid og Nutid) in 1895 and the Women Artists’ Retrospective Exhibition (Kvindelige Kunstneres Retrospektive Udstilling) in 1920 in Copenhagen.