Sarah Bernhardt in a Japanese Garden

Louise Abbéma and the actress Sarah Bernhardt (1844-1923) met in 1871 and became good friends. Abbéma earned critical praise for the painted portrait of Bernhardt she exhibited at the Paris Salon exhibition, and Bernhardt appears in a number of the artist's subsequent works. This invented scene showing the actress wearing a kimono within a bamboo garden structure is one of a number of fans Abbéma created during the late 1880s when she became greatly interested in Japanese art.