Henri Edmond
CROSS

Henri-Edmond Cross, Henri Edmond Joseph Delacroix of his real name, was born in Douai in 1856. While his family owned a hardware store, he was encouraged to enter the world of art by his cousin and mentor, who had recognized his talent as a child. The young man went to Lille where he was entrusted to Carolus-Duran and Alphonse Colas to be trained. He made his debut at the 1881 Salon, where he chose to present himself under the pseudonym "Cross", the English translation of his name, in order to distinguish himself from his illustrious predecessor, Eugène Delacroix.

A naturalist painter at first, Henri-Edmond Cross gradually moved closer to the Neo-Impressionists, seduced by their libertarian ideals. As early as 1896, he offered drawings, watercolors and lithographs to Jean Grave for his anarchist journal Les Temps Nouveaux. Always following this ideological movement, Cross was able to befriend personalities such as Charles Angrand, Théo van Rysselberghe or Maximilien Luce, who painted his portrait. It was with Paul Signac that he adopted, in 1891, the technique of divisionism, founded a few years earlier by Georges Seurat.

The painter distinguishes himself by his generous brushstrokes in clear and sharp color tones. It was when he chose to settle in the Var region of France in the 1890s that Cross really began to incorporate Provençal subjects into his work. His work influenced the Fauvist painters, such as Henri Matisse, and was part of the pointillist movement that developed strongly at the end of the 19th century. The painter died in Saint-Clair (Lavandou) in 1910, at the age of 54.