The present painting is an exceptionally large example of Sickert's Venetian portraits, most of which are 45.7 x 38.1 cms. It is one of the most powerful and experimental portrait studies that Sickert accomplished during his extremely fruitful visit to Venice over 1903-1904.

A woman is shown seated on a chaise longue. Her only clothing is a shawl through which can be seen her breasts and belly. She does not wear shoes and her feet and toes are clearly discernable. The resulting painting is not only daring in its subject matter but also in its handling of paint and dates from a crucial moment in Sickert's career.

Discussing the importance of this period in Venice, Wendy Baron, the leading authority on Sickert has writen, 'The work that Sickert did in Venice in 1903-4 was exceptionally significant in the light of his later development. At the age of 43 he initiated his exploration of the type of subject which was to become characteristic of his work after his return to London, those figure paintings for which he is perhaps best known today and which had, in their own time, a profound influence on a whole generation of younger English painters. In Venice he tackled not only single figures in the intimacy of domestic surroundings but also two-figure groups which foreshadow the Camden Town 'conversation pieces'. [...] the overall direction of his experiments with different methods of painting was of greater relevance to his general evolution than any one method considered in isolation. Nearly all the methods of handling he employed in Venice were designed to help him discover a shorthand system for stating the essential tones, patterns, and character of his subjects. Swiftness, directness, and economy were the qualities he sought and these were the qualities he continued to develop in his handling of paint over the next few years.' (see W. Baron, Sickert, London, 1973, pp. 80-81).

The subject of this painting has usually been identified as La Giuseppina, a Venetian prostitute, who was one of Sickert's favourite models of this period. However, although Wendy Baron previously suggested this identification, she has recently stated that she believes that the subject may in fact be another Venetian woman, possibly one of La Giuseppina friends, La Carolina. Although the shawl and hair style are found in paintings of La Giuseppina, they were a familiar fashion at the time and it is known that La Giuseppina also brought her friends and her mother to sit for Sickert.

Baron records two drawings of a model seated on a couch set nearly parallel to the picture plane, which relate to Study in Rose. These are La domenica della santa, also known as Sunday must be kept Holy and La Santa - Venezia (James Hyman Gallery).

La Santa - Venezia, drawn at the time of Sickert's seminal visit to Venice in 1903-04, the setting and subject matter may be compared to his painting Study in Rose. The same woman, possibly La Carolina, is shown seated on the same chaise longue, wears her hair in a similar style and has a comparable posture.

The most striking difference between the drawing and painting is the clothing. In the drawing the woman sits demurely in her finest attire in marked contrast to the less restrained painting in which the woman is draped in a shawl that reveals her breasts, belly and bare feet. This difference is matched by Sickert's method of depicting the subject. In the drawing, just as the woman is dressed up in clothes that are not her natural garb, so Sickert uses a style that is also unusually elegant. This is far removed from the robust style of the more louche painting, in which elegant attire is replaced by a shawl. An explanation for this change is provided by Sickert, whose inscription on the drawing states La Santa - Venezia. In the drawing, then, the woman is dressed up in honour of the Saint's day, whilst in the related painting her profession as a prostitute may be inferred by her comparative undress.

In Venice Sickert sought a new economy, experimenting with innovative forms of notation, which would allow him to retain subject detail, whilst giving paint and colour a freer reign. Previously, Sickert's handling of paint had ranged from thin and translucent layers, in delicate works that owed much to Whistler's example, to more robust paintings in which the surfaces are dense and opaque, but in Venice he began to work with a bold new brevity. This allowed Sickert to gain a greater immediacy and convey more directly his encounter with the subject before him. As Sickert himself wrote at the time:

"I have gained a great deal of experience working every day from 9 to 4. Not to embarrass the canvas with any preparations. And so to give the paint every possible chance of drying from the back of the canvas. To paint with 1/2 raw oil and 1/2 turps. To state general tones once and once only. And when the first coat is dry, to finish, bit by bit."

The present painting displays this new boldness in Sickert's handling of paint and the looseness with which he now used the paint. Its symphony of pinks also demonstrates Sickert's use of tone, applied in dramatic sweeps, precise dabs and broad expanses, as part of his desire to lighten not only his touch but also his palette. As Sickert explained in the same letter:

"I had the bad habit of re-stating the tones all over an indefinite number of times, and getting no further, not improving the colour, and making the canvas, especially in the darks, more and more disagreeable."

In Study in Pink, Sickert demonstrates how far he had moved from this, to produce a wonderfully daring image of great immediacy and bold economy in which important information is conveyed with the minimum of fuss.