Gerald Laing loomed large in the British Pop Art movement, having helped to define the 1960s with huge canvases based on newspaper photographs of famous models, astronauts and film stars - his striking image of Brigitte Bardot, her face framed by a roundel, is one of his most famous works, created while still a student at St Martin's College in the 1960s. His screen-prints were produced during 1968 in New York by Laing himself on his kitchen table in his apartment. He developed his dot painting technique whilst at St Martin's and was fascinated by the abstract pattern which only resolved itself into a recognisable image when viewed from a distance.

'I did the painting from which the screen-print Brigitte Bardot is derived in January 1963, during my third year at St. Martin's. It was only the fifth painting which I had made using my new idiom, and it was certainly the largest and most successful thus far. I had refined my technique and above all had a clearer idea of the grain of the painting, governed by the interval of the ruled grid. The painting measures 152.5 x 122 cm and the source for it was the logo on the request for entries for the 1963 Young Contemporaries Exhibition - a black and white photograph of Brigitte Bardot on which a black circle had been superimposed. I quite cheekily painted this image and submitted it for the exhibition, and it was duly selected. Now, with the passage of time, my image has eclipsed its long-forgotten source.' Gerald Laing, Kinkell, 2006.