Vicari said his portrait of Maria Callas was the hardest to paint of all the works in the collection

When Augustus John sat for Vicari in the 1960s, he insisted he was drawn not painted

Francis Bacon's work greatly impacted on Vicari while at the Slade school of art in London

Edith Piaf was the "living embodiment" of Edward Munch's Scream to Vicari

Vicari was introduced to Albert Einstein by the scientist's niece in the 1950s

Vicari's first portraits of Ella Fitzgerald were done on plates