Sea And Sky: Henri-Edmond Cross

How dots and daubs of paint, meticulously applied, resolve themselves into a masterpiece of sea and sky, bathed in the Mediterranean light.

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the death of Henri Edmond Cross (20 May 1856-1910).

Cross was born at Douai, near the northern French industrial city of Lille but it was Monaco, where he lived with parents after 1883 that inspired his landscapes, with its dazzling sunshine and dramatic coastal views. It was his father's cousin, Auguste Soins, who encouraged the boy's talent for drawing.

Cross studied in Paris with Carolus Duran, who also taught John Singer Sargent in the 1870s. Cross exhibited his work at the first Salon des Independents in 1884, founded by him and his friends, notably Georges Seurat. But it was not Paris, capital of the art world that he wanted to paint.

Around 1904, Cross began painting according to the theories that chemist Michel Chevreul (1786-1889) developed during his tenure as Director of the dye works at Gobelins Manufactures (think: tapestries). Cross and his friend Paul Signac experimented with divisions of color and light and their interactions. Cross was then living at Saint-Clair, a small town near Saint-Tropez.

Sometimes, as in Landscape with Stars, Cross combines his characteristic daubs of paint with abstract washes of color, more characteristic of his watercolors.

The critic Felix Feneon was the first to point out that Cross the Divisionist was himself divided in himself between a desire to reproduce reality and an ambition to transcend it. Feneon purchased Cross's transcendent work Iles d'Or when it was exhibited for the first time in March 1905.

Images:

1. L'Iles d'Or, 1905, Musee D'Orsay, Paris.

2. The Evening Air, 1893, Musee D'Orsay, Paris.

3. The Boats, no date, Louvre Museum, Paris.

4. Landscape With Stars, c.1905-1908, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC.