The New Zealander Frances Hodgkins stayed at Flatford Mill, on the River Stour, near East Bergholt in Suffolk, England -John Constable country - from the end of June to November 1930. She was painting and preparing for her exhibition to be held at the St George's Gallery, London that autumn. One of the pictures in that exhibition was entitled ‘Flatford Weir’, and she also painted a number of pictures of Flatford Mill, Willy Lott's Cottage and other subjects in the neighbourhood. Another picture of Flatford Mill that was in the collection of the art dealer Lucy Carrington Wertheim (1883-1971), now at Towner Eastbourne (EASTG 1263) was bought from the St George's Gallery in 1930. This painting was owned by Sir Kenneth Clark (1903-1983) before he gifted it to the Contemporary Art Society in 1946 and probably also acquired it at the same exhibition. Two photographs of her at Flatford Mill, in one of which she is seen looking at this picture, were published in The Sphere, 27 September 1930.
