In a letter to Colin Anderson, the previous owner of this work, Sutherland commented on Wales, 'I wish I could give you an idea of the exultant strangeness of this place - for strange it certainly is, many people whom I know hate it, and I cannot but admit that it possesses an element of disquiet ... the whole setting is one of exuberance - of darkness and light - of decay and life. Rarely have I been so conscious of these elements in so small a compass' (G. Sutherland, Welsh Sketchbook, Horizon, No. 28, 1942).