Pehr Ljung ( 1743-1819), an ornamental sculptor in Stockholm , was appointed royal court sculptor in 1788. The embroidery's motif is derived from the series "Six Views in the Island of Jamaica", published by John Boydell in London in 1787. George Robertson's depictions are some of the earliest known views from the Caribbean. They depict sugar plantations owned by slave owner William Beckford of Somerly (1744-1799), cousin to the more famous Tomas Beckford. When he moved to Jamaica in 1773 to take over the estates he had inherited, he brought with him the landscape painter George Robertson. England had taken over Jamaica from Spain in 1655 and would hold it for over 300 years. Robertson's series of engravings portray the plantations as fertile and well-maintained paradisiacal scenes, without any elements of the brutality the slaves lived under. Louis Belanger, active in Sweden from 1798-1816, executed six paintings based on Robertson's engravings towards the end of the 1790s, which were reproduced in colour aquatint by J. Merigot and published by Colnaghi, Sala & Co in London in 1800 (see fig). In 1784, Gustav III had purchased the island of Saint-Barthélemy from France where he established a small capital named Gustavia.