Olaf Rye's Square towards South East

In January 1882 the Munch family moved into a flat on Olaf Ryes plass in Grunerlokka, a quarter on the east side of Kristiania thrown up in a hurry for workers from the mills along the Akerselva river. Munch was 18. He had left technical college two years earlier to paint, and that autumn he took his first studio, shared with six other young artists on Karl Johan street. This view across the square toward the south east is oil laid straight onto unprimed cardboard, about 20 by 24 centimetres, the size of a sheet of writing paper. He came back to the same square in further studies over the following year.