Kossoff has acknowledged that attending evening classes given by David Bomberg at the Borough Polytechnic was an important early stimulus for Leon Kossoff, as it was for Frank Auerbach, who encouraged his friend to attend these classes. Although both Kossoff and Auerbach both studied full-time at St Martins and then the Royal College of Art, it was through Bomberg's teaching, above all, that they were set on their own paths. Both, however, have rightly sought to stress the individuality of their own particular concerns.

Kossoff, for his part, has stressed that however great his admiration for other artists, it all seems far removed from the actual practice of working in the studio: true certain books seem to burn a hole in my mindcertain painters mean more than otherswe've talked about theseI know I saw various exhibitions when I was a student, yet even fairly recently, though I did dozens of drawings from the Marsyas, I am unable to see how Titian has influenced me. My life long obsession has been to teach myself to drawsomehow once I start work 'art' stays one side of an invisible barrierit all works on a much deeper level.'

Drawing is at the center of his practice and the artist has even commented that 'painting is a form of drawing'. The present drawing is one of Kossoff's earliest self portraits, predating by some years a self portrait drawing in the collection of the Tate. Its tenderness and intimacy mark it apart from earlier precursors, including Seurat's conté drawings, to which it has a superficial resemblance, and from other self portraits by the artist, which are often more anguished. In its wholeness and all over-completeness it contrasts markedly with Kossoff's more characteristic method of building an image through a dense scaffolding of assertive sweeps of charcoal, which give a strong sense of the artist's movements across the sheet of paper.