Picasso’s painting is a milestone in the development of the Cubist style. The faces of the two women to the right were inspired by Iberian sculpture and African masks. Picasso would have come in contact with these artworks because France, at the height of their colonial power, removed many artifacts from their geographical and cultural contexts and displayed them in museums.

The voluptuous blonde is a recurring figure in Colescott’s paintings. She represents an object of desire that is a stereotype in its own right. The blonde-haired, blue-eyed Eurocentric ideal of beauty is in strong contrast to the other representations of femininity in this painting.

This watermelon slice is a nod to the fruit platter in Picasso’s painting. For Picasso, whose scene is in the South of France, this is a symbol of fertility. In the context of Colescott’s painting, which depicts the southern United States, the watermelon takes on a different meaning as it was a frequently recurring motif in racial stereotypes of Black people.