Sickert's oeuvre reflected the changing sensibilities between the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and he was recognized in his day as a talented painter, etcher, writer, and teacher. His associations with the older artists James McNeill Whistler and Edgar Degas influenced his early work, and his mature style combined aspects of theirs. It also incorporated avant-garde ideas being considered by his British contemporaries in the Fitzroy Street Group and the Camden Town Group. His pictures heralded the common man, popular music-hall entertainment, and domestic life.

Maple Street, London is one of Sickert's rare nocturnal scenes, depicting an almost deserted corner near his Fitzroy Street studio. The artist's palette of deep plums and olive greens captures the colored shadows caused by night's fast approach. In 1910 Sickert wrote of "the prelude or the refrain of movement, the promise of movement to come, or the echo of movement past," which could aptly describe this painting, in which the static, claustrophobic arrangement of the buildings creates an overwhelming sense of stillness and isolation. In 1920 the artist reprised this subject in an etching.