Paul Laib was born in Hamburg circa 1870 and in 1901 was recorded in the census return as a naturalised British subject working as a photographer from his home in South Kensington. He photographed works of all the major artists working in Britain between 1900 and 1945, such as the society portraitists, De Laszlo, Sargent and Birley and young contemporaries such as Piper, Hepworth and Nicholson.