Wilhelm A. Vita was born in 1846 and began his artistic training from 1862-1867 as a student at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna under Johann Nepomuk Geiger and Heinrich von Angelis. He settled in Vienna in 1870.

From 1870 Vita was a member of the Vienna Künstlerhaus . In 1889, based on the Paris exhibition “ Salon des Refusés ”, he founded the so-called “Salon of the Rejected”, from which the Vienna Artists' Club emerged in 1891 .

In 1875 he painted portraits of the Baron of Lichtenfels and the Knight of Schmerling. This promoted him to the aristocracy circles and soon he got numerous commissions from the imperial house. Several times he portrayed the Crown Prince Rudolf and Emperor Franz Josef as well as Archduke Karl Ludwig and Archduchess Margarete as abbess.