Bush and the artist Noel Laura Nisbet (1887-1956), whom he married in 1910, lived in the same semi-detached house in Oueensland Avenue. Merton Park, SW 19, (a gift from Noel’s father) from 19|4 until their deaths. Over the years Bush regularly depicted the suburban back gardens seen from his studio. many of which were exhibited at The Royal Academy, as was the case with this work in 1940. Bush saw the ancestry of his art in the quiet dignity of Dutch and Flemish domestic scenes. and, as his younger daughter recalled, mixed pigments and oils, ‘so that his work should mellow, slow and last, and if possible, improve’,