Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Claude Monet painted together on many occasions, including at Argenteuil, where Monet lived. The products of their work were never closer than the similar paintings they made of the duck pond at Argenteuil, in which the short brushstrokes, colors, and points of view are almost identical. The paintings are often quoted to prove the collaborative relationship between the two men.

Pierre-Auguste Renoir often used his friends as models for genre scenes, most of which were posed and painted in the studio. The sitters for this small painting were the amateur critic Georges Rivière and the artist's model Marguerite Legrand, known professionally as Margot.