Pale bone is built from broad, buttery strokes of ochre, tan and umber, with the brush marks left visible so the skull looks carved rather than painted. Dark eye sockets and bared teeth face out of a nearly black background, and a thin ribbon of smoke curls up from the small orange ember of the cigarette.

The composition follows Vincent van Gogh's well-known skull-with-burning-cigarette painting, a darkly humorous memento mori. Warm light on the cranium and the single spark of glowing colour give it a quiet, theatrical intensity.