Winston's approach to figurative portraiture is inspired in part by English painter Francis Bacon (1909-1992). Bacon—who in his harrowing papal portraits riffed on Diego Velázquez (1599-1660), himself riffing on Titian (c. 1488-1576)—once stated his view on the successive layers of history informing his creative process:

"Great art is always a way of concentrating, reinventing what is called fact, what we know of our existence—a reconcentration, tearing away the veils that fact requires through time. Ideas always acquire appearance veils, the attitudes people acquire of their time and earlier time. Really good artists tear down those veils."

Hugh M Davies and Sally Yard, Francis Bacon (New York: Abbeville, 1986), 110.