The painting is kept at the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg. The work was painted by Gauguin in Paris in 1894, after returning from a trip to French Polynesia. The scene is set in Tahiti, an island that the artist visited in April 1893. Gauguin represents a tranquil scene of island life: in the foreground a woman eats a fruit, while the one sitting next to her keeps her eyes closed and her face on the palm of the hand; behind you can see two other darker female figures. In the background are represented rocks and a large mango tree, to the right of which some people are engaged in a typical Polynesian dance in homage to the statues of the goddesses Hina and Fatou. The subjects in the foreground contain a symbolic message: the woman holding an apple represents Eve, the emblem of sin; The girl next to her, asleep and with her head "enclosed" in a halo, is Mary, symbol of purity and redemption. The surrounding landscape is painted in abstract colours which are unreal and very suggestive. Gauguin is captivated by the primitive simplicity experienced in Oceania and by the harmony of the relationship between man and nature experienced there.