The son of an engineer, Bob Crossley was born in Norwich, before the family moved to Rochdale in 1914. Mostly a self-taught artist, he moved to Penwith near St Ives, Cornwall in 1959 where he stayed for the rest of his life painting, making occasional visits back to Rochdale. This painting is typical of Crossley’s focus on colour and abstraction and is one of over thirty paintings, prints and drawings the artist donated after his retrospective exhibition held at Touchstones Rochdale in 2004.