Beaux painted Dorothea and Francesca (1898; Art Institute of Chicago) in the tobacco barn on the property of the Gilders' summer residence in Tyringham, Massachusetts. The young sisters had invented a simple, playful dance, which they performed artlessly. Beaux made this her subject and spent the early autumn working on it under increasingly challenging conditions: I built a platform with my own hands, as the girls could not move easily on the bare earth. When it rained hard, in September, the orchard let its surplus water run down the hill and under the barn-sill, so that, as my corner was rather low, I put on rubber boots and splashed in and out of my puddle. . . . October was difficult, for it grew bitterly cold. But valiant posing went on, though the scenic effect of the group was changed by wraps. Beaux very likely saw Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose at the Paris Universal Exposition in 1889. The painting of the dancing Gilder daughters might be her response. (http://www.ourstory.info/2/a/CBeaux.html)