Between 1901-03 Gallen-Kallela together with Pekka Halonen painted a cycle of frescoes on the subject of life and death taken from the Kalevala epos for a Mausoleum in Björneborg situated at Käppärä Churchyard, which had been commissioned by F. A. Jusélius in commemoration of his daughter who had died at the premature age of eleven. The commission appealed to Gallen-Kallela since he himself had lost a daughter, Marjatta, at a young age. One of the pictures in the cycle entitled ”Nybygge” ”Settlement”, depicts a family in the process of building a timber cottage in the forest by a lake.

In 1905 Gallen-Kallela painted his world famous picture ”Lake Keitele”, know in the National Gallery, London, which is based on studies painted at Konginkangas by Lake Keitele in central Finland during the summer of 1904. The present work was probably painted in the same region and on the same occasion.