Crosbie painted Womb from Womb during the Second World War, in 1941. It is a monumental self-portrait demonstrating Crosbie’s increasing interest in surrealism. The painting was made five years after the International Surrealist Exhibition in London, which was hugely influential on the art of many English and Scottish painters. Such surrealist work was however a rarity among the relative conservatism of the Scottish art scene of the period, and so demonstrates Crosbie’s innovative and highly inventive outlook.