The painting depicts the fountain of Palermo’s botanical garden, the favourite visiting place for famous travellers from Richard Wagner (1881) and Auguste Renoir (1882) to Gabriele D'Annunzio (1899), Alfred De Musset and Oscar Wilde (1900).
The botanical garden was a place of inspiration for the painter as well as a place where he could study and draw from life the various plant species and the marshy and woody areas he chose as settings for his paintings.