Ponte San Trovaso (Venice)

Cross spent his life painting the dry, sun-struck coast of Provence, so Venice was a change of element for him: stone, water and mist in place of pines and open sea. He travelled to Italy in the early 1900s and came away struck by the old Venetian painters, Tintoretto among them. For this canvas he passed over the grand views around Saint Mark's. He painted the Ponte San Trovaso, a modest bridge over a narrow canal in the Dorsoduro district. Beside it stood the squero di San Trovaso, one of the last yards in the city where gondolas were built and repaired. He was a long way from the Var here, working in a city built entirely on water.