At first glance, this painting appears strictly decorative. It seems to fail as a decorative piece, however, as it looks unfinished and garish. Closer inspection of the painting reveals that it fulfills its true function. This painting is not so much about the subject portrayed, but how it was created. This painting is art about making art.

This picture portrays an outdoor scene, perhaps in a garden. The picture is crowded and chaotic. The painting lacks a sense of depth. The figures in the foreground fill most of the picture, with a small corner of the canvas (top left) devoted to the background. There is no middle ground. In the foreground, there are three figures: two women and a dog. One woman occupies the top right quarter of the canvas, while the other fills most of the left half of the picture. The dog is in the bottom right corner. The woman on the left is seated in a wicker or rattan chair. She leans forward towards the viewer, pointing or reaching to something on the ground. The other woman also leans forward to look, placing her right hand on the first woman's right shoulder. Meanwhile, the dog tries to jump into the seated woman's lap. There are also three figures in the background. These figures appear to be a trio of formally attired men. Their features are generalized and almost non-existent.

Bonnard did not use the technical methods commonly associated with oil painting, i.e., many thin glazes applied with tiny brushstrokes. His brush was heavily loaded with paint and left clearly distinguishable brush marks. He applied the paint thickly, but only built up a few layers. The thickly applied paint is especially obvious in the marigold flowers at the bottom left. To paint the marigolds, Bonnard put down a thick layer of pigment and then used a sharp object to inscribe the petal outlines into the paint. Texture, not color, delineates the petals.

The paint has not been applied so thickly that earlier brushwork, or even the canvas, is completely obscured. Bits of canvas show through most clearly in cases of the dog, the scarf, and the gingham dress. Bonnard painted the dog by dabbing a heavily loaded brush to the canvas, leaving much of this portion of the canvas exposed. In clothing, the canvas shows through because the colors do not quite match up and empty canvas remains between the color blocks of the gingham dress. Bonnard's preliminary drawing also shows through the paint.

The underdrawing is clearly visible on many parts of the canvas. In some places, Bonnard left the canvas completely exposed - in others, it is visible through layers of paint. These lines are clear in most of the foreground. The underdrawing of the dog is especially noticeable. The splotchy surface of the dog's fur reveals much of the underlying canvas and underdrawing. Bonnard diverged strikingly from his preliminary design of the dog. In the underdrawing, the dog's left front shoulder is convex, but the final shoulder is concave. In additionally, vertical green lines under the paint of the dog's back serve no obvious function.

In addition to the canvas and underdrawing, Bonnard allowed some of the painted-over colors to show through. The marigold flowers, leaves, and stems cover the gingham dress, but the viewer can still see through them to the gingham. This may be simply attributable to spatial positioning, except for the following: at some point before Bonnard finished the painting, a large marigold filled the lower left corner. He painted over this flower, but allowed bits of yellow to show in the gingham. The transparent tip of the nose in the same shade of light blue as the adjacent square in the gingham dress. The tip of the nose also overlaps a dark square, but this part of the nose was also corrected in light blue. In making the correction to the dog's nose, he seemingly substituted one mistake for another. The outline of the dog's right paw also seems unrealistic. The outline near the top of the paw continues in one line away from the dog and across the gingham dress. The fact that he made no effort to correct these inconsistencies suggests that he was pleased with their accidental effect or had intended to make them from the outset.

The actual technique of the painting suggests that the process of making art was very important to Bonnard. Contrary to the initial impression of a careless painting, this painting was exhaustively planned. The painter's presence is not only felt, but emphasized. After going through the effort of applying the preliminary drawing to the canvas, Bonnard does not stay within his own lines, or even cover them. This suggests either carelessness or a deliberate effect. I believe it is the latter. He wants to show the process of painting. He revealed the canvas and underdrawing, left both mistakes and corrections visible, and did not mix all his pigments to a uniform shade. Finally, the signature is large and ornate. It is part of the composition. It emphasizes the presence of the painter and the fact that this is a painting. Bonnard clearly intended this painting to tell the viewer something about the way art was produced.