This half-length portrait depicts Warrington artist Oswald Garside. Oswald was born in Southport in 1869, the son of a manufacturing chemist. In 1883, his family moved to Warrington, where he became apprenticed to Robert Garnett and Sons, the furniture manufacturers. He studied at Warrington School of Art between 1892 and 1894, and then went on to study at the Académie Julian in Paris, under a Lancashire County Scholarship.

After leaving Paris he spent 18 months in Venice where he befriended fellow Warrington School of Art graduate, Henry Woods. On his return to England, Oswald spent a year in Warrington then took a studio in London. From 1900 onwards he concentrated on painting watercolours. He exhibited paintings at the Royal Academy, and was elected to the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours in 1916.