By replicating functional, mass-produced objects in gleaming metals, Barker has redefined Marcel Duchamp's concept of the ready-made. Barker emerged as a Pop Artist during the 1960s when he was exhibiting with the legendary Robert Fraser. Known as 'groovy Bob', Fraser was the first to introduce American Pop Art in Europe and had a clientele including the young stars of the music and cinema worlds on both sides of the Atlantic. Barker was an intrinsic part of the Swinging Sixties. Cast in bronze, Gifts tricks the receiver out of the sense of excitement at discovering the surprises inside, thus turning the meaning of a gift into a practical joke. Its actual state of inaccessibility comments on the extremes of consumerism and the overrated importance of gift giving as a means to express affection in our present day society.

Barker's work features in the following museum collections: Tate, London; British Museum, London; National Portrait Gallery, London; Staedtische Kunsthalle Mannheim, Museum für Modern Kunst, Frankfurt; National Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide; Museu Coleção Berardo, Modern and Contemporary Art Museum, Lisbon; The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.; Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia.