According to a letter written in 1944 by Miss P. Pirie, the artist's sister, who donated these paintings to the V&A, Helen Pirie 'studied mostly in Paris at the Académie Delécluse in the rue Notre Dame des Champs and also at Julien's [School of Art], and for a short time in Rome'. The pictures comprise twenty-two watercolour paintings and nine black and white drawings, all of them illustrations to the Pirie sisters' book 'Kashmir: The Land of Streams and Solitudes' (London: The Bodley Head, 1908). In her letter to the V&A the donor went on to describe their travels together:
'We spent the greater part of three years in Kashmir, going up in March & staying till November or late October each year. We went up the Gilgit Road by special permission as, in those days anyhow, ordinary travellers were not allowed on that frontier road. We did not go by the usual route, but a wilder way over a higher pass than the Burzil. We went to the foot of the first glacier of Nanga Parbat, & camped there at Taroking for several days. Other parts we went to were Kishtwar, the Margan Pass, & Chamba. We usually marched in & out of Kashmir by the Pír Panjal route as we found it more interesting than the usual route by tonga [carriage] - now by motor - up the Jhelum Valley. As we were alone we could please ourselves, & as we could speak Hindustani & soon picked up a little Kashmiri, we had no trouble.'
This picture shows a mountain pass with two men standing together and four pack-horses grazing.