Manitoba Willows marks a turning point in Brooker’s career. For the first time, he fully fuses abstract and representational elements. Art historian Joyce Zemans suggests a reason for this shift: “Brooker came to realize that most people could not respond to his abstract ‘world and spirit paintings’ and turned from his early experiments in abstraction.” From this point forward Brooker’s career would be increasingly devoted to finding various ways to mix abstraction and representation.