Executed circa 1906, this work relates to a series of horse and rider studies which Picasso made in the winter and spring of 1906 in Paris for the gouache Chevaux au bain, the most finished study for an ambitious composition known as L'Abreuvoir, which was ultimately never realised (Pierre Daix and Georges Boudaille, Picasso, 1900-1906, Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre peint, Neuchâtel 1966, pp. 287-288, nos. XIV.8-XIV.16, illustrated). The figure of the woman carrying a cruche on her head relates closely to a group of three small sketches drawn at Gósol in the spring of 1906, and to the drawing Femme Portant une cruche in the Baltimore Museum of Art (Josep Palau i Fabre, Picasso Vivo (1881-1907), Barcelona 1980, p. 440, nos. 1210-1212 and 1215)