In light of the recent sale of Francis Bacon's portrait of Henrietta Moraes (left, 1963), I would strongly recommend anyone interested in the foibles of Britain's most successful post-war artists to read Moraes' self-penned book 'Henrietta'. She paints a picture at odds with the prevalent representation of late fifties/sixties London dominated by pictures of grubby children frolicking in East End terraces and leggy blondes on Carnaby Street.
As well as describing sitting for Bacon and Freud (Girl in a Blanket, 1953), Moraes evokes the world of Soho's eccentric denizens such as photographer John Deakin and the fantastically named Muriel Belcher (landlady of The Colony Room).
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