Charles Atherton Cummings

The artist Charles Atherton Cumming was one of the most important influences upon the development of the arts in Iowa. Cumming expressed an interest and talent for art and drawing at a young age, even winning a first place prize at a county fair. He attended Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa, but as there was no program for the arts there, he was encouraged to enroll in the Chicago Academy of Design, which later became the Art Institute of Chicago. After finishing his studies he returned to Cornell College and persuaded the administration to allow him to begin teaching art. His course was quite successful and he was soon given a better studio and made a member of the faculty. In 1885 and 1889 he traveled to Paris and attended the prestigious Académie Julian, helping to further his understanding in the European academic art tradition that he would teach in Iowa. In 1895 he came to Des Moines to take over the Des Moines Academy of Art, which had been struggling, and within five years had made it a great success. The academy was renamed The Cumming School of Art in 1900. In 1909 he was invited to help build the art program at the State University of Iowa and split his time between Iowa City and his school in Des Moines. Cumming’s work with the school taught a generation of young artists in the academic style, giving them the traditional skills in draftsmanship and the discipline needed to become successful artists. He was also a well-known artist in his own right, best known for his portraits, but he also created exquisite landscapes and still-lifes, all based upon his classical academic style with aspects of impressionism. Cumming was part of the Capitol Improvements Committee which brought art into government buildings and created public murals, of which he created his own in 1912 for the Polk County Courthouse titled Departure of the Indians from Fort Des Moines. In 1914 he became the superintendent of the Department of Art at the Iowa State Fair, which judged and awarded artists during the state fair and set the standards of taste for many years. As times changed, Cumming did not and his very traditional style of teaching and art became passé as more modernist tendencies were popularized in art. Cumming’s art may have lost favor in the ensuing years, but it was his teaching and development of an entire generation of artists that was his most lasting influence. Cumming created an awareness and place for art in the state of Iowa, allowing later artists to further develop the arts of Iowa into the vibrant and creative community that it is today.