Dorelia McNeil was the model and mistress of Gwen John's younger brother, the painter Augustus John. In 1903 Gwen John took Dorelia with her on a lengthy walking holiday in provincial France. They started in Bordeaux, and spent the winter in Toulouse. Here she painted four portraits of Dorelia, all by artificial light. She had learnt at Whistler's school in Paris the merit of limiting the range of tones in a painting. The slightly unsettling concentration on the model's eyes, in this case staring directly outwards, is characteristic of Gwen John's approach to her sitters. Gwen John went from Toulouse to Paris, where she lived for the rest of her life.