Though now one of Canada’s most well-known artists, Emily Carr long struggled for acceptance in both her personal life and her artistic career. Born to an established mercantile family in Victoria, British Columbia, Carr pursued her studies in painting at the California School of Design in San Francisco shortly after her parents’ deaths. She later studied at Westminster School of Art in London, England in 1899. Carr travelled extensively and was once mentored by Lawren S. Harris.

Painted late in her life, Undergrowth reflects the artist's preoccupation with the great rainforests of the coasts of Vancouver Island. Like much of her later work, this piece is invested with her personal vision of the transcendent forces within these places. Today, this perspective is recognized as a romanticized western image of Indigenous land.

Painted in 1941, this painting is part of the Emma Read Newton Collection in the University of Alberta Museums.