Heward often painted women in rural settings. She enjoyed painting and sketching landscapes around Fernbank on the St. Lawrence River, where her family had a cottage, as well as areas of rural Quebec. Here, the fence serves as a barrier between Rollande and the farm behind her, suggesting that this farmer’s daughter is symbolically turning her back on her past. With her tight mouth and angled eyebrows, she has an intense, even angry, appearance. Heward established a pattern of illustrating solitary women as modern, self-contained subjects.