Unusual among his contemporaries, Albert Marquet was actively encouraged by his family to pursue a career in painting. He enrolled in the École national des arts décoratifs in 1892 where he became acquainted with Henri Matisse. Later, during his time at the École des Beaux-Arts, he met Henri Manguin and Charles Camoin. Together these artists would go on to form the Fauve movement, which took the Parisian art world by storm at the 1905 Salon d'Automne, where critic Louis Vauxcelles' disapproving description of their daringly colorful work as the output of "les fauves"—wild beasts—gave the group their revolutionary moniker. 

Painted at the height of Marquet's Fauve period, Pont de Blackfriars, Londres is one of a series of London cityscapes that he made throughout his career. Marquet's serial exploration of views of the city directly echoes the Impressionists' atmospheric urban landscapes. His interest in depicting the Thames, in particular, is illustrative of his lifelong affinity for bodies of water. During his well-traveled career, Marquet and his easel regularly gravitated toward such locations, from the ports of Rotterdam to the coastlines of North Africa to settlements along the Bosphorus.