Max Liebermann presumably made this intimate portrait of his wife Martha (neé Marckwald) shortly after their wedding on 14 September, 1884. Despite her strong personality she was not as present in public as her famous husband was. Accordingly "little is known about Martha Liebermann's character, .. She did not like her husband making portrays of her, many pictures show her sitting, reading or sleeping, as these were the only momens she actually sat still for her husband." (Quote after: www.stolpersteine-berlin.de/de/biografie/4854; on 15 July, 2015). After her husband's death and her family's emigration, she did not decide to flee in time and was informed about her deportation to Theresienstadt on 5 March, 1943. Martha Liebermann took an overdose of Veronal and died a few days later in the Jewish hospital in Berlin.