This previously lost painting exemplifies Eugène Fromentin's fascination with the camera. Painted at the end of the 1860s, the composition is derived from a photograph taken by Fromentin on one of his many journeys to North Africa. Fromentin added figures to the image and changed some of the positions of the palm fronds to enhance the vision, thereby employing the camera as a compositional aid.

Fromentin travelled to Algeria and Egypt several times. The years 1846, 1848, and 1853 were chronicled by two diaries, Un Eté Dans le Sahara, and Un Année Dans le Sahel. His writings were as well-received as his paintings, and occasionally they inspired one another. The ending of Une Eté Dans le Sahara was the basis for the 1869 Salon entry of Le Pays de la soif (Musée d'Orsay, Paris) which was also an homage to Géricault's The Raft of the Medusa.

Fromentin's other 1869 entry, Une Fantasia: Algerie (Musée des Beaux-Arts, Poitiers) was also based on his travel journal. In November of this same year, Fromentin accompanied the writers Théophile Gauthier and Charles Blanc, as well as the painters Narcisse Berchère and Jean-Léon Gérôme, on a tour of Egypt to celebrate the opening of the Suez Canal. It is therefore probable that during this journey Fromentin took the photograph that is the foundation of our painting.