Hew Locke is a sculptor and draughtsman. Although people often interpret his work as deriving from Caribbean or South American traditions, his inspiration has come as much from Europe as anywhere else. He often uses drawing in his sculpture, and his drawings bear the same complicated motifs as those inscribed on his sculpture.

Especially since the later 1990s, his work has addressed the cross-cultural trading that came with the economic relationship between Empire and colonies. In his drawings of fantastical figures, such as this one, dress and stance suggest the imagery of painters such as Velázquez, Hogarth and Goya, as well as of Victorian popular print - all from epochs when British and Spanish Imperialism was at its height. The heads of Locke's figures are often replaced with animal faces or skulls - a device frequently used by Goya. The costume of this figure is decorated with an intense pattern of skulls, interwoven with the words 'import' and 'export'. This brings to mind the imagery of the Mexican Day of The Dead, but also suggests the relationship between death and trade.