Henri-Edmond Cross was a French Impressionist. Throughout his life he maintained a close friendship with Paul Signac and was also friends with Georges Seurat. Characteristic of his oeuvre is the regular, pointillist brushstroke. At first it was delicate and short – as in our painting Sailing Ship. After 1895 the brushwork became broader and the colours stronger. Cross began his training in Lille and continued it in Paris in 1881. There he exhibited at the ‘Salon des Artistes français’. In 1883 he visited the south of France, which brightened his colour palette and turned him towards Impressionism. At this time, the painter abandoned his original surname Delacroix to avoid confusion with Henri-Eugène Delacroix and from then on called himself Henri-Edmond Cross.