Georges Seurat was not only an exponent of pointillism, but the grandfather of the technique, which uses tiny brushstrokes of varying colours to represent the play of light and shape. Pointillism grew out of the French school of neo-Impressionism in the 1900s.
This technique is also referred to, though less commonly, as divisionism. Due to its strongly continental origins, references to the French 'pointillisme' are to be found even within English art books.