La Rue Norvins à Montmartre

The period around 1910 to 1912 in which Utrillo painted the present work, was a crucial juncture in his early career. Although his application to the École des Beaux Arts had been rejected in 1909, Utrillo gained initial recognition from both critics and collectors. The dealer Louis Libaude signed a contract with him and promised his mother, the painter Suzanne Valadon, that he would look after her son. Soon after, three of Utrillo's landscapes were shown at the Salon d'Automne. Utrillo tried to work outdoors, but was unnerved by attention from onlookers, and so he retired to his studio on the rue Cortot in Montmartre, where he worked from memory and from his supply of postcards which his mother had given him.

It was during this time that Utrillo realized a personal and unmistakable style in his Manìere blanche, the 'White Period', so named for the bleached and ashen palette he employed in his views of Paris. Utrillo sometimes even mixed plaster with his white oil colours to mimic the weathered facades of buildings.

Utrillo's most frequent subjects were buildings in the Paris neighbourhood of Montmartre, and like La Rue Norvins, they were represented numerous times with only slight variations from canvas to canvas. La Rue Norvins is a magnificent example from the Period blanche, notable for its solid and meticulous rendering of perspective, heavily impastoed buildings, and featured at the centre, the most famed landmark of the 18th arrondissement of Paris - the glorious Basilique du Sacré Coeur de Montmartre.