After graduating from the Tokyo School of Fine Arts in 1924, Saeki Yuzo took his wife and child with him to Paris. Condemned by Maurice de Vlaminck for his academicism, Saeki, moved to 13 Rue de Chateau, near Montparnasse station, in search of a new style. With the streets of Paris his stage, he established a style of depicting, in free brushwork, walls of buildings and the advertisements attached to them. This painting depicts the front of a shoemaker’s shop on the same street as his atelier. He is known to have painted the same place at least three times. One was accepted in the Salon d’Automne and purchased by a German painting supplies company.