Jack Beal attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) in the 1950s, when drawing from life was still an important part of the curriculum. Throughout his career he remained dedicated to the realist tradition, even though at the time realism was regularly accused of being old-fashioned and irrelevant. His wife, Sondra Freckelton, had been a fellow SAIC student, and many of Beal’s paintings during the 1960s depict her in various poses. In this drawing he portrayed her reading as he worked.