Alan Cuthbert was formerly Head of Foundation Studies at Wimbledon School of Art, and this is when and where this portrait was painted. His passion was colour, about which he never tired of thinking and talking. He devised colour scales and used colour matching from nature as a means of discovering unusual and beautiful colour structures and combinations for his abstract, often systematic, paintings. He was an active member of the Colour Group of Great Britain (a body founded to foster cooperation between art, design, science and industry). Alan Cuthbert died in 1995.