Lesley Dumbrell has been an exponent of geometric abstract painting since the 1960s. In 1966, she began teaching at RMIT and met American colour field painter James Doolin, who introduced her to the new medium of acrylic paint. Dumbrell was a leading figure in the women’s art movement in the 1970s, and in the development of abstract painting in Australia. After travelling to New York in the early 1980s, she began to experiment with coloured shapes that interlock across the canvas, as can be seen in Zavana.