In a modest interior lit by a central window, a woman sits absorbed in her work or reading. The painting’s clean lines and quietist atmosphere suggest Hammershøi’s admiration for Johannes Vermeer, 17th-century Dutch master of serene domestic scenes. Hammershøi produced 60 paintings of the apartment on the Strandgade in Christianshavn, Denmark where he lived with his wife (the model for this picture) from 1900 to 1909.