James Tissot Notebook

The model for this painting was Tissot's mistress Kathleen Newton, née Kelly (1854–1882), a divorcee and only in her early twenties when she met Tissot. She appears in several of his paintings. The background of the picture was Tissot's own large garden of 17 Grove End Road in St John's Wood, where he lived from 1873. The garden, including the impressive cast-iron colonnade, the pool and the chestnut tree, appears in a number of his pictures. In 1880 or 1881 she contracted tuberculosis and died in 1882. After her death Tissot left London and returned to Paris.