Many of Gillian Ayres' paintings took titles from Greek myths and from the world of opera, and it was obvious that she looked to such sources for strength, drama and passion, qualities she admired and wished to convey in her paintings. She said of Titian and Rubens, two painters she revered, that they use the medium of painting in the fullest possible way, displaying 'a complete combination of heart and mind…' This was something Ayres strove to emulate, and it is notable that this work has the word 'heart' in its title. Her acknowledgement of these great painters is reflected in two ways in this work, firstly in the medium chosen, and secondly, in the format. Ayres' painting career now spans more than five decades, and although she began by painting in oils, she moved on to commercial household paints, especially Ripolin enamel (led in this choice by such mentors as Picasso and Jackson Pollock) and then to acrylic paint, which she used exclusively from the late 1960s to 1977.