Ivar Arosenius arrived in Paris for the first time in January 1904. He befriended a number of Scandinavian artists who were active in Paris at this time. An artist he knew from Gothenburg, Axel Törneman, had recently arrived from Munich. The two friends both fell in love with the Norwegian singer Gudrun Höyer-Ellefsen. Whilst Törneman won Höyer-Ellefsen’s heart, she felt motherly affection for Arosenius and often cared for him during his periods of illness in Paris.

In the summer of 1904, Ivar Arosenius and Axel Törneman left Paris for a little fishing village, Coudeville, in Normandy. They checked into the simple inn Soleil levant. Gudrun Höyer-Ellefsen joined them there two weeks later.

They stayed until sometime in August, and Arosenius made a number of works documenting their time there. The present work is a charming triple portrait. Arosenius and Törneman are pacing back and forth outside the inn, waiting for Gudrun Höyer-Ellefsen who is depicted in one of the rooms above the inn.