The process of stringing beads involved gathering the beads onto wires from a small wooden tray with a bowel type trough placed in their lap. These two seated women appear to be sharing one of these wooden trays, as another woman looks on.
The painting was made in the same Palazzo corridor as A Venetian Interior. For whatever reason, the paintings on the walls are absent from this rendition.
A Venetian Interior
1880-82
2003 - Sargent and Italy
2001 - Circa 1900: From the Genteel Tradition to the Jazz Age
1999 - Masterworks at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery
1998 - American Paintings from the Masco Corporation
1997 - Uncanny Spectacle: The Public Career of the Young John Singer Sargent
1997 - Sargent Abroad, Figures and Landscapes
1990 - American Painting and Sculpture at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute
1989 - Moving Pictures
1986 - John Singer Sargent
1985 - Antiques
1984 - Venice: The American View 1860-1920
1983 - John Singer Sargent
1979 - Albright-Knox Art Gallery: Painting and Sculpture from Antiquity to 1942
1971 - From Realism to Symbolism Whistler and his World
1970 - John Singer Sargent: Paintings, Drawings, Watercolors
1964 - American Artist
1964 - Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute Bulletin
1926 - The Buffalo Arts Journal
1926 - Catalogue of the Inaugural Exhibition
1916 - Blue Book
1913 - Academy Notes
02-02-2003 - 09-14-2003: Sargent and Italy
03-03-2001 - 08-25-2002: Circa 1900: From the Genteel Tradition to the Jazz Age
06-12-1997 - 09-07-1997: Uncanny Spectacle: The Public Career of the Young John Singer Sargent;
The Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA,June 12 - September 7, 1997
10-01-1986 - 04-17-1987: Venetian Bead Stringers
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
October 1, 1986 - January 4, 1987
The Art Institute of Chicago, IL
February 4 - April 17, 1987
02-27-1985 - 04-21-1985: Exhibition Title Unknown
10-20-1984 - 01-20-1985: Venice: The American View, 1860-1920
The Museum of Fine Arts, San Francisco, CA
October 20, 1984 - January 20, 1985
10-19-1983 - 12-18-1983: Americans in Venice
Coe Kerr Gallery, Inc., New York, NY
October 19 - November 19, 1983
Boston Atheneum
November 22 - December 18, 1983
04-05-1978 - 12-09-1979: John Sargent and the Edwardian Age
03-04-1971 - 05-23-1971: Whistler and His Contemporaries
04-18-1964 - 01-03-1965: The Private World of John Singer Sargent
The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
April 18 - June 14, 1964
The Cleveland Museum of Art, OH
July 7 - August 16, 1964
The Worchester Art Museum, Worchester, MA
September 17 - November 1, 1964
Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute, Utica, NY
November 15, 1964 - January 3, 1965
07-02-1961 - 07-18-1961: Fifteen American Painters-from the Albright-Knox Art Gallery
12-05-1954 - 01-30-1955: Dedication Exhibition of Memorial Center
John Singer Sargent, An Exhibition -- Whitney Museum, NY & The Art Institute of Chicago 1986-1987
Sargent and Italy 2-2-2003 thru 9-14-2003
Image from John Singer Sargent, Whitney Museum, 1987