In 1914, Melbourne-born artist Charles H Lancaster moved to Brisbane to manage the stained-glass department at RS Exton and Co., where William Bustard was subsequently appointed as chief designer. Brisbane’s ensuing building boom inspired both Lancaster and Bustard to make paintings of the dynamic civic projects developing around them, and they became active members of the city’s flourishing artistic community.

In 1937, Lancaster was awarded the Royal Queensland Art Society Jubilee Medal and exhibited A corner of Brisbane in the Society’s 49th annual exhibition. The artwork hung alongside other street scenes, such as Bustard’s Summer haze 1937, which attracted the interest of the art critic for Brisbane’s Telegraph.

Lancaster’s cityscape depicts the canopy of fig trees near the Eagle Street fountain, while the view across the river features St Mary’s Anglican Church, above Kangaroo Point. The decorative pediment of the second building on the right identifies it as the Royal Bank of Queensland, on the corner of Elizabeth and Creek streets.