Melvin Earl Cummings

Last updated • 1 min readFrom Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia

Melvin Earl Cummings (August 13, 1876 July 21, 1936), also known as M. Earl Cummings, was an American sculptor active in San Francisco, California. [1]

Contents

Biography

Melvin Earl Cummings was born on August 13, 1876, in Salt Lake City, Utah. At the age of 20, his entire family moved to San Francisco. [1] He studied sculpture first at the Mark Hopkins Institute of Art in San Francisco, under Arthur Mathews and later Douglas Tilden, and subsequently from 1900 to 1903 at the École des Beaux-Arts, Paris, under Louis Noël and Antonin Mercié. [1]

After his return to San Francisco, he became professor of sculpture at the Mark Hopkins Institute (now San Francisco Art Institute), which position he retained to 1915. In addition, in 1906 he was appointed instructor in modeling (and later promoted to assistant professor) in the University of California, Berkeley's School of Architecture, which position he held until his death. He was succeeded in his role at U.C. Berkeley by Jacques Schnier. [2]

Cummings also served on San Francisco's Golden Gate Park Board of Park Commissioners from 1904 until his death, and several of his works are located in the park. His son, Ramy Ramsdale Cummings, was the model for his father's "Indian Boy" statue in the Pool of Enchantment grouping, [1] and a Bohemian Club photographer.

Selected works

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Golden Gate Park</span> Public park in San Francisco, California, United States

Golden Gate Park is an urban park between the Richmond and Sunset districts of San Francisco, United States. It is the largest park in the city, containing 1,017 acres (412 ha), and the third-most visited urban park in the United States, with an estimated 24 million visitors annually.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Douglas Tilden</span> American sculptor

Douglas Tilden was an American sculptor. He was deaf from a bout of scarlet fever at the age of four and attended the California School for the Deaf in Berkeley, California. He sculpted many statues that are located today throughout San Francisco, Berkeley, and the San Francisco Bay Area.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Henry D. Cogswell</span>

Henry Daniel Cogswell was an American dentist and a crusader in the temperance movement. Cogswell and his wife Caroline also founded Cogswell College in San Jose, California. Another campus in Everett, Washington was later dedicated in his honor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jo Mora</span> Artist, sculptor, illustrator

Joseph Jacinto Mora was a Uruguayan-born American cowboy, photographer, artist, cartoonist, illustrator, painter, muralist, sculptor, and historian who lived with the Hopi and wrote about his experiences in California. He has been called the "Renaissance Man of the West".

Aristides Burton Demetrios was an American sculptor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert Ingersoll Aitken</span> American sculptor (1878–1949)

Robert Ingersoll Aitken was an American sculptor. Perhaps his most famous work is the West Pediment of the United States Supreme Court Building.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John McLaren (horticulturist)</span> Park superintendent in San Francisco (1847-1943)

Dr John Hays McLaren (1846–1943) served as superintendent of the Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, CA for 56 years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">California Midwinter International Exposition of 1894</span>

The California Midwinter International Exposition of 1894, commonly referred to as the "Midwinter Exposition" or the "Midwinter Fair", was a World's Fair that officially operated from January 27 to July 5 in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Savage Bolles</span> American architect

John Savage Bolles was an American architect. He was most active in San Francisco, and the designer of Candlestick Park. He was a founding partner of the architecture design firm Ward & Bolles.

Dana King is an American broadcast journalist and sculptor. She served as an anchor for the CBS owned-and-operated station KPIX-TV in San Francisco. In 2012, King left KPIX to pursue her passion in sculpting and art. Her outdoor sculpture commemorating the Montgomery bus boycott is displayed at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama. King uses historically generalized and racist ideas that requires indepth researches, to provide information on the normative misrepresentation of Black peoples' emotional and physical sacrifices.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Burt Johnson</span> American sculptor

Burt William Johnson was an American sculptor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arthur Putnam</span> American artist

Arthur Putnam was an American sculptor and animalier who was recognized for his bronze sculptures of wild animals. Some of his artworks are public monuments. He was a well-known figure, both statewide and nationally, during the time he lived in California. Putnam was regarded as an artistic genius in San Francisco and his life was chronicled in the San Francisco and East Bay newspapers. He won a gold medal at the 1915 San Francisco world's fair, officially known as the Panama–Pacific International Exposition, and was responsible for large sculptural works that stand in San Francisco and San Diego. Putnam exhibited at the Armory Show in 1913, and his works were also exhibited in New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, Paris, and Rome.

<i>Pacifica</i> (statue)

Pacifica was a statue created by Ralph Stackpole for the 1939–1940 Golden Gate International Exposition held on Treasure Island in the San Francisco Bay. Stackpole's largest sculpture, it towered 81 feet (25 m) over the entrance to the Cavalcade of the Golden West in the Court of Pacifica. The Court of Pacifica was dedicated to the heroic explorers of Pacific Ocean territories. Pacifica was the theme statue for the exposition, representing world peace, neighborliness, and the power of a unified Pacific coast.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ruth Cravath</span> American stonework artist and arts educator

Ruth Wakefield Cravath (1902–1986) was an American stonework artist and arts educator, specifically known for her public sculptures, busts and bas-reliefs in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Carl Larsen Park is a 6.6-acre (2.7 ha) neighborhood park in the Parkside District of San Francisco. It lies on the west side of 19th Avenue, at the intersection with Vicente, and just north of Stern Grove. The park is named for Carl Larsen, a chicken rancher, who donated the land for the park to the City in 1926. Larsen Park features a baseball diamond, tennis court, basketball court, playground and indoor pool; the pool, formerly named Larsen Pool, is now named for local swimming instructor Charlie Sava.

Jacques Schnier (1898–1988) was a Romanian-born American artist, sculptor, author, educator, and engineer. He was a sculpture professor at the University of California, Berkeley from 1936 to 1966.

<i>The Doughboy</i> (San Francisco) Statue by Melvin Earl Cummings in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, California, U.S.

A statue of a doughboy by Melvin Earl Cummings is installed in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, in the U.S. state of California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Statue of John McLaren</span> Statue in San Francisco, California, U.S.

A statue of horticulturist John McLaren is installed in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, in the U.S. state of California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Statue of Robert Burns (San Francisco)</span> Statue of Robert Burns by Melvin Earl Cummings in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, California, U.S.

A statue of Robert Burns by Melvin Earl Cummings is installed in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, in the U.S. state of California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bruno Zimm (artist)</span> American sculptor

Bruno Louis Zimm was an American sculptor. He created a variety of works: fountains, memorials, freestanding sculptures, and architectural sculptures.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 California Art Research, WPA Project 2874 (PDF). Vol. 6. San Francisco, CA. 1937. pp. 114–131.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  2. Dungan, H.L. (August 16, 1936). "Berkeleyan Is Exhibitor In S.F. Gallery" . Newspapers.com. Oakland Tribune. p. 22. Retrieved 2022-05-09.
  3. "San Francisco Point of Historical Interest: The Doughboy in Golden Gate Park". NoeHill.com. 2012. Retrieved 2022-05-09.