Born to Paint: Two Brothers, Two Paths

Found: One Painting, One Clue

Spotlight on One Work by Wylie Warren Curry

On a June day of this year, Beth Smith of Chagrin Falls, Ohio walked into a chain thrift store in North Randall, Ohio. An art enthusiast, she was keeping her eye peeled that day for interesting artistic items. Lying inconspicuously on a shelf was a painting. She picked it up, admired the colors and bold brush work, and saw the signature: Wylie Warren Curry. Immediately, she Googled the name in hopes of identifying the painter. Her hope was to possibly bring the painting together with a member of the painter's family. As luck would have it, her query was directed to the first installment of this family history blog created just the month before. Unlike his brother Noble's name, Wylie's name did not have a web presence prior to my writing about the two brothers. Beth bought the picture for half the marked price. It was 50% off day at the thrift shop.

Beth wrote to me within days of finding my grandfather's painting. "I have one of your grandfather's paintings," she typed. She asked what paintings of his I owned. I replied immediately, assuming that at sometime in her past, Beth had bought or been given one of Wylie's numerous portraits. But when she
wrote that the painting was of a mountain, and that she had recently found it in a thrift shop, I was intrigued. I didn't know of any landscape painting my grandfather had ever done. After spending time trying to identify where the mountain was located, Beth spotted a shred of paper clinging to the back of the painting. A bit of pencil writing revealed that this was a painting of Yosemite National Park's famous Half-Dome, a massive stone mountain soaring up from Yosemite Valley in California. This revelation surprised me; when had my grandfather ever been to Yosemite? When I was a child in Seattle, my Curry grandparents only visited once, and they traveled directly by train from Cleveland. Was it true, then, that my grandfather left Ohio for a time so that he could be a "vagabond" and ride the rails? Did he leave during the Depression so that he could paint his way across the great West? I had heard through a cousin and my mother that he had done this, but until now have had no evidence of it. Neither of them knew any particulars about this period of my grandpa's life, and my father never mentioned this to me. This painting provides a possible clue, some pictorial evidence, that he stood in awe of places far from his Ohio homeland, and painted them.

Soon, Beth had the painting packaged and shipped to me. What a generous act. I could not be happier to own a second painting, and such an atypical one, by my grandfather. My family now has a total of four of his oils, so I am exceedingly grateful to Beth Smith. To any future readers of this family history, please contact me if you know of any artworks by Noble Wilbur Curry or Wylie Warren Curry that are in private hands or in a museum. We all wish to locate as many as possible. Thank you.

Below is the full painting (16.5" x 20.5") of Half-Dome by Wylie Warren Curry. Please scroll down to read a commentary on the painting technique of this work and the panel it was done on .

When a painting is done in one sitting, with the paint applied wet-into-wet, it is called alla prima painting. For a brief commentary on this classic technique, click here. For a plein air (on-site, outdoor) painter, this technique is ideal. Paintings done using the alla prima approach have a fresh, impressionistic appearance with no fine, fussy detail. The painting reads well from a distance, the brushstrokes blending through the viewer's eye, the lights and darks of the image being distinct. In this painting, look closely at the row of trees at the base of Half-Dome. Confidently made with a wide brush, the strokes hardly look like trees, but from a distance, is there any question that they are trees? Where the light hits the top of Half-Dome, several warm, light colors are in each creamy stroke. The cool blues and lavenders of the shaded stone are unnatural, yet read without a doubt as cool shade.

One final note: the painting is done on a Masonite panel. This material was invented in 1924 (see a reader's comment posted below) and soon was adopted by painters as an alternative to stretched canvas. Would my grandfather have carried cut panels of Masonite with him as he explored the west? More economical than canvas, Masonite would also travel well. Ultimately, it is fortunate that Half-Dome was done on a panel. What appear to be knife slashes appear in quantity on the lower half of the painting. What befell this artwork? How did it end up in a thrift shop in North Randall, Ohio? Will I ever find out if my grandfather, who was an excellent provider, actually left home to seek adventure as far west as California?

(Postscript, May, 2013: Last month I removed the frame of this painting in order to have the image scanned professionally. With a magnifying glass I could see that what looked to be a smudge of paint under the signature was in fact a date: 1962.)

If you, the reader, can offer more clues or help locate more paintings by Wylie and Noble Curry, please email me (click at top of right column). Thank you!

 

The 1920's: The Brothers' Paths in Peacetime

Left: A recently recovered early painting by Wylie Warren Curry, Half-Dome, Yosemite, possibly 1930's. This painting was found in an Ohio thrift shop in June, 2011, and shipped to me by the finder. She identified WWC through a Google search that brought up this blog. I'll write more about this painting in my next post.

In 1920, The Great War was over and a new era began in the United States. Prohibition was in effect, women were granted the right to vote, and a two-year economic depression from 1920-1921 affected industry and economic stability. Birth rates dropped, and immigration numbers slowed. It was a time of change and growing modernity.

By 1920, Noble Curry had completed the illustrations The History of Battery C. He worked for his father's insurance company after returning from service in France and Germany. It was also at this time that he attended art classes at the Columbus Art School. Sometime in 1920, seeking further art education, Noble moved to New York City to study at the progressive The Art Students League® of New York. One of Noble's teachers there was John Sloan, a painter with strong convictions about drawing and painting in a freer style, a non-academic approach to artwork. Reading about John Sloan helps give us insight into Noble's development as an artist. I recommend reading the illuminating profile of Sloan by clicking on his name above. Very few of Noble Curry's artworks, many of which are in the private collection of his family members, were dated but two drawings identified as having been done while he was a student at the The Art Students League belong to one of his grandchildren. Here is one: the back view of a female model rendered in charcoal, the long-standing drawing medium of choice for studio drawing.

Noble married Margaret (Peggy) Fritz in 1923. In 1925, he drew one of several dramatic portraits of her, one of which is below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

During this period, Wylie Curry continued to work for the jewelry and medallion company. He did the rendering for the 1925 World Series winners, The Pittsburgh Pirates.

A review of available photos of the two brothers led me to guessing that the picture below of Noble plowing (uncharacteristic, it would seem!) was taken in the 1920's. I know that the photo of my grandfather Wylie was taken ca. 1925. In my next article, I will portray the two brothers as they survived the Depression and continued raising their families and doing artwork to help sustain them through very difficult times.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Above: Noble Wilbur Curry, ca.1920's             

Right: Wylie Warren Curry, ca. 1925

The Brothers as Artists in Wartime

1917-1918: Noble Wilbur Curry

The United States declared war on Germany on April 6, 1917, thus entering World War I just 19 months prior to the signing of the Armistice on November 11, 1918. A draft was created, war funds were raised through various means, and American servicemen were mobilized to fight on the allied fronts in Europe. The War had been in progress for three years. My great uncle, Noble Wilbur Curry, was 23 years old, unmarried, and eligible as a Class 1 draft candidate. Written records show that he was immunized in 1917, trained, and sent to France with the rank of Private in the U.S. Army, Battery C on June 12, 1918. The steamer arrived at the port of LeHavre, France, by June 28. This is the date of the first sketch in Noble's Skizzenbuch (Sketchbook), an illustrated journal of his active duty in France and Germany. When his artistic talent became evident to his commanders, he would become the battalion artist, keeping a record of battles and marches in his Skizzenbuch.

Above, a detail from one of Noble's battlefield sketches that was published in The History of Battery C by Frank L. Zimpher, published in 1919 by F.J. Heer Printing Co.

Ruined country and village on old Verdun Front. October 18, 1918.
   

Battery C fought at Verdun, France, but not in the historic 1916 battle that took place there. In Noble's Skizzenbuch, he wrote that the first shot was fired on October 6, 1918. Above is one sketch he made of the Verdun area. All the sketches in his book were obviously done quickly, but with skill. No doubt he had but a few minutes to capture a scene. A deft way of working quickly served Noble very well. 

A week before Armistice Day, Noble recorded a grim scene in his sketchbook, and this written account:

Nov. 3, 1918. Zimpher [author of the book about Battery C] and I slept in a small dugout in the foreground of this sketch after a day's travel through this shot-up country. The Yanks drove [the German soldiers] through here at a Hell-gait a few days before we arrived. An American buried in the foreground. A German shell bursting near a road on the left.

Above: this comprehensive battle drawing, the detail of which is at the top of this page, was completed in 1919. Another particularly fine drawing in this series, drawn from an interesting perspective from above and behind, is shown below (blue areas at the bottom are reflections in the framing glass).

Following the armistice, Battery C and many allied troops participated in the "March to the Rhine." In this drawing, weary foot soldiers, horses, and riders trudge to an old bridge that will take them across the Rhine river. On November 26, 1918, Noble wrote:

Stopped in small town (Brouch) near here a week or more. Slept in hay mow. Fine sleeping, but very miserable in daytime--cold and wet, no place to go and warm up. Wood very scarce. Men hungry half the time--poor food supply. Getting better now. This march to the Rhine is harder and more tiring than days spent at the front.

Noble would spend five additional months in Germany, France and Luxembourg after crossing the Rhine on December 14, 1918. He continued to make drawings in his sketchbook, and possibly completed the more developed drawings for The History of Battery C. The last entry in his sketchbook is dated April 4, 1919. Noble returned to the U.S. on May 22, 1919.

My heartfelt thanks to Georgeanne Curry Frawley and Mary Curry Shirley, Noble's daughters, for access to his artwork. To family members and other readers: please comment with corrections and additions if they are needed.

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1917-1918: Wylie Warren Curry

At the time war was declared on Germany, the economy in the United States was healthy and the Progressive Era was affecting both social and industrial elements in significant ways. The war had not yet sapped resources from the country because of the late entry into the European war. It was this healthy economy that allowed my grandfather, Wylie Warren Curry, to find work as an artist.

Above, a rendering of the stylized bust of Chief Obbatinewat, the logo for Shawmut Bank, established in Boston in 1836. This bank was widely recognizable in Greater Boston over the next century and a half.

In 1917, Wylie was a married man of 28 with a 3 year-old child, my Aunt Jean. He would have had a temporary deferment from the draft. Employed as an illustrator for a company that made jewelry, cast medallions and enameled metal pieces, his skills at rendering dimensional images became finely honed. His skill at lettering was probably learned both in school and on the job, but as a lettering artist myself, I admire his artful lettering design integrated with his illustration. Grandpa once told me that for this kind of work, he would sometimes use a brush that consisted of one hair.

The age of the automobile was in full gear in 1917. Winther Motor Trucks, a new company in Kenosha, Wisconsin, began production of a rear-wheel drive truck. Whether Wylie designed the original logo I don't know, but here is his rendering of it for die makers to follow in producing the metal piece that would be mounted on the trucks. Below, a full-page ad for the new trucks appeared in The Literary Digest of March, 1918.*   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Right: the Schwinn bicycle company was thriving in Chicago in 1918, producing both motorcycles and bicycles. An Admiral model is still being manufactured by the company. Wylie's rendering of this headplate was probably from this era, but I haven't yet located an example of it on a bicycle. The Celtic-inspired capital "A" creates a strong central logotype in a balanced design.

In 1919, Noble returned to Ohio after the war, and my grandfather would become a father for the second time, to Charles, my father. Noble married in 1923, and would become a father to Georgeanne in 1924. Both brothers would continue working as artists, but their philosophical differences about the role of art in earning a living would eventually inpact their relationship and contribute to driving them apart. In my next installment, I will focus on their lives and artwork of the 20's.

 *Image courtesy of Wisconsin Historical Society
 

 

 

Embarking on Their Careers: The Brothers' Art Schools

A note to family members: Please write with additions and corrections. Thank you!

Wylie Warren Curry was born in 1889, and Noble Wilbur Curry in 1894. I know little of their childhoods other than they were born in Delta, Ohio (Wylie) and Findlay, Ohio (Noble), and both later attended respected art colleges. Wylie enrolled at the Cleveland School of Art, founded in 1882. The Cleveland School of Art was renamed the Cleveland Institute of Art in 1948.

Evidently Wylie participated in theatrical activities at art school. This is the only photo I have of him from those years. Student artwork (presumably) is behind the thespians.

Noble was granted a scholarship to attend the Columbus Art School, founded in 1879, one of the oldest operating art schools in the nation. Noble attended here following his service in the Army. The college was later renamed the Columbus College of Art and Design. 

 Noble also studied at The Art Students League® of New York, where atelier classes still offer artists advanced training. More on his work at this institution can be found in a later post.

On the right is a detail of a self-portrait (an etching) by Noble, completed in the 1920's.

  The education of artists in the early 20th century would have been demanding. Students were expected to study anatomy of both the human being and animals of all kinds. As will be evident as I post more artwork by both brothers, Wylie and Noble both had excellent drawing skills. Those were considered essential at that time, so rigorous curricula in drawing and drafting were required.

Wylie's Tierformen Atlas* was a pictorial anatomy textbook for artists that he kept from his art school days. (Scroll down to see the images.) In 1977, my father had the book rebound before giving it to me. Published in 1899 in Dresden, Germany, the book is filled with highly detailed and notated lithographed images. I have looked through the book to find any marks that my grandfather would have made, and on the page with the human skeleton, he has marked proportional numbers to the right of the skeleton. On the same page is the mark where a drop of coffee must have landed. Other than these marks, the book is immaculate. The cover shows the signs of many years of use, however. (Click on images to enlarge.) Early in the careers of both men, correct rendering was important in their work. As they worked as artists after college, Noble's direction gradually went toward abstract painting and printmaking. Wylie's never did, even in his expressive personal artwork. In my next post, I'll contrast the work the two brothers were doing, and the very different lives they were living, during the years 1918 and 1919.

*From Wikipedia's translation: Schaefer, Maximilian: Comparative studies on the anatomy of humans and animals for artists, artisans and amateurs. Animal forms text and atlas. 2 Bde. Dresden, Kühtmann, (1899). 2 vols Dresden, Kühtmann, (1899). (The book is written entirely in German.)