In this painting Chris Gollon creates a nod to Rothko, and also demonstrates his own masterful use of saturation contrast to make the pure red of the flower sing out. At the time it was painted Gollon was re-looking at the various possible colour contrasts, such as simultaneous, complimentary and saturation contrast, among others. Using the latter, he took the colour red and mixed differing quantities of black with it, creating many tonal ranges of the same colour, which serve to amplify the pure red of the petals.