The work was created during the artist's initial eighteen-month stay on the island of Tahiti during a period of his opus which has been described as "exuberant".[2]
The painting was purchased in a private sale in 2008 by the Russian billionaire oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev for 54 million euros (then approximately $85 million USD). Then in 2017 he sustained a more than sixty-million-dollar loss on his investment when he sold it at auction for $25 million USD.[3]