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Charles Culver
Charles Culver Landscape Winter Road Watercolor Signed & Dated
1943

About the Item

The idyllic atmosphere of this country scene falls within a couple of styles one being regionalism, an American realist modern art movement that included paintings, murals, lithographs, and illustrations depicting scenes of rural and small-town America primarily in the Midwest and frequently associated with Grant Wood and Thomas Hart Benton. The other style is romanticism wherein the scene depicted is a more desired or dramatic version of what actually is. “Untitled (Winter Road)” is a quiet country scene depicting a road leading into the distance either going to or coming from a local farm. The snow does not particularly seem fresh suggesting a melt and the coming of spring. This piece has been professionally reframed with acid-free matting and conservator glass. In a 1952 Detroit Free Press article, entitled “Artist Explains His Work,” Culver was asked why he painted the way he did. He stated: “I try to ‘see’ though not too exactly; I try to think though not too ponderously; I feel emotion yet I try not to become overwrought. I interpret rather than describe, and design rather than depict. I work with values, not light and shade; hence, when I am successful, I achieve substance rather than three-dimensional form, and this satisfies me as being wholly sufficient. In my work I wish to be serious without becoming a bore, exuberant without being frivolous, humorous without being silly. I believe that good paintings are conceived, not contrived; and I am interested in art much more than in pictures.” Charles Culver was born in Chicago, 1908, and by his early 20’s was studying commercial art which would provide a skill for a job, but was not his first choice for artistic study. In the 1920s he worked as a cartoonist for the Royal Oak Tribune. He wrote and illustrated several “children’s” books which were really intended for a more adult audience, now called graphic novels a hundred years later. He was also a musician, tenor sax and clarinet, and went on the road with Gene Goldkette. While living in Bellaire, Michigan, in the 1950s he was a regular in jam sessions at a popular local bar. He worked on and off at the Chevrolet Studios in the General Motors Building in Detroit, located on W. Grand Blvd. near Woodward, as a commercial artist. He did this in order to make enough money to support himself and his wife for a couple years at a time during which he painted full time. He did this work/paint regimen until he finally gained enough recognition by the 1930’s to begin receiving invitations to exhibit his paintings in galleries such as the Gordon Beer Gallery in Detroit, the Detroit Artists Market, the Michigan Artists at the DIA, the Butler Institute of American Art in Youngstown, Ohio, and the International Watercolor Exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago, to name a few. In the 50s, he commenced his ten-year teaching career at Arts and Crafts in Detroit, now known as College for Creative Studies. Arts and Crafts was an important formative artistic teaching institution for many local and national artists. Some of the faculty and graduates include Richard Jerzy, Harry Bertoia, Doug Chaing (currently director of Lucas Film), Stephen Dinehart (game maker, writer, designer connected with The David Lynch Foundation), Tyree Guyton (international artist), Herb Babcock, Jerome Feretti, Kevin Siembieda (writer, designer and publisher of role-playing games), Renee Radell, Philip Pearlstein, Charles McGee (nationally recognized African American sculptor of animal and dancing spirits), Philip Pearlstein (2000 Honorary Doctorate, Modern Realism style), John Louis Krieger (American Modern), William Girard (American Modern), Henry Heading, Hughie Lee-Smith, and Joseph Wesner. Culver wrote a monthly newsletter for the faculty and students called Topic and Talk, established his humorous philosophy and vocabulary. He took on the role of art critic for the Detroit Free Press for two years during which he verbally slashed to pieces what he perceived to be the pretensions of avant-garde art. Culver had over 25 one-man shows in the Detroit area alone, won 14 prizes at the “Exhibition for Michigan Artists” sponsored by the Detroit Institute of Arts, including the Scarab Club Gold Medal in 1940-43, and is represented, according to a curator at the DIA with sole 90 paintings in the DIA’s permanent collection, more than any other Michigan artist. His work is found in museums and private collections both nationally and internationally.

Creator:

Charles Culver (1908 - 1967)

Creation Year:

1943

Dimensions:

Height: 18.25 in (46.36 cm)Width: 21.75 in (55.25 cm)

Medium:

Watercolor,Paper

Movement & Style:

Naturalistic

Period:

1940-1949