This work is one of R. B. Kitaj’s earliest paintings and remained in his possession throughout his life. It was first illustrated in 1989, at which time it was titled as ‘Little Convert’. Kitaj painted it during the brief period when he lived and studied in Vienna in 1951–52. Speaking to the writer Julian Ríos, Kitaj said about this painting: ‘I gave Little Convert a title only recently—because, aged twenty, I almost became a Catholic in Vienna for about two weeks. The Little Convert doesn’t look like me because I never became one!’ In Vienna, he was briefly under the spell of a charismatic Roman Catholic priest named Monsignor Ungar, and an atmosphere of religiosity coloured his later recollections of the city.