Fred Cuming, RA, NEAC

FRED CUMING, RA,NEAC

British 1932 – 2022

Frederick ‘Fred’ George Rees Cuming was born in 1930 in London. Cuming studied at Sidcup School of Art from 1945 to 1949 and, after he had completed his National Service, went on to study at the Royal College of Art from 1951 to 1955, where he gained a Rome Scholarship and an Abbey Minor Scholarship. In 1964, he was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy (ARA), and a Royal Academician (RA) in 1974. He is also a member of the New English Art Club.

His later works include Italian scenes, such as Venice, and much of his time was devoted painting the Southern English coastline, including Hastings and Rye. His art has a distinct impressionist quality which captures “the fleeting impressions of his surroundings”. He first encountered such landscapes as a child evacuee during the Blitz. The powerful contrast to his home in London created an enduring love for it, and Cuming chose to live and work in the countryside of Rye, near Ashford, Kent.

Cuming’s first solo show was held in 1978 at the Thackeray Gallery, London, and since then he exhibited regularly in many solo and group exhibitions throughout the UK and the United States. In 2001, he was given the honour of being the featured artist in the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition, with an entire gallery within the show dedicated to his work.

On describing his work, Cuming was quoted: “I am not interested in pure representation. My work is about responses to the moods and atmospheres generated by landscape, still life or interior. I am interested in the developments of 20th-century painting in abstraction…and in new ideas and art forms. My philosophy is that the more I work the more I discover. Drawing is essential as a tool of discovery; skill and mastery of technique are also essential, but only as a vocabulary and a means towards an idea. I struggle to keep an open mind.”

In a review for the BBC, Andrew Walker said: “Fred Cuming’s haunting, vaguely Turneresque, painting, Ferry to Polrwen, combines great subtlety, especially in his skilful representation of a lowering sky, with an end-of-era feel, strongly redolent of Turner’s own masterpiece, the Fighting Temeraire.”

Among Fred Cuming’s many awards are the Grand Prix Fine Art (1977), the Royal Academy’s House & Garden Award and the Sir Brinsley Ford Prize (New English Art Club, 1986). His paintings are held in private collections throughout the world.

Awards
House and Garden Award, 1994
Grand Prix de l’Art Contemporaries, 1988
Sir Brinsley Ford Award, New English Club, 1986
Joint winner of Grand Prix Fine Art, Monte Carlo, 1977

Fred Cuming Solo Exhibitions
Thompsons, London, 2006
Thompsons City gallery, London, 2004
Alresford Gallery, Alresford, 2002
Thompsons City Gallery, London, 2001
Adam Gallery, Bath
Neville Gallery, Canterbury
Alresford Gallery, Alresford
New Grafton Gallery, London, 2000
Barneys Gallery, Greenwich, Connecticut, USA, 1999
Thompsons City Gallery, London
Neville Gallery, Canterbury
Alresford Gallery, Alresford, Hampshire
Adam Gallery, Bath
The Vogel Gallery, Dallas, Texas, USA, 1998
New Grafton Gallery, London
Jonleigh Gallery, Guildford
Jorgenson Gallery, Dublin
Thompsons City Gallery, London, 1997
Alresford Gallery, Alresford, Hampshire
New Grafton Gallery, London, 1996
Mason Watts, Warwick
Thompsons City Gallery, London, 1995
Jonleigh Gallery, Guildford
New Grafton Gallery, London, 1994
Sinfield Gallery, Burford
Mason Watts, Warwick
New Grafton Gallery, London, 1992
Sinfield Gallery, Burford
Drew Gallery, Canterbury, 1991
New Grafton Gallery, London, 1990
Easton Rooms, Rye
Sinfield Gallery, Burford

Fred Cuming Public Collections
Bradford and Scunthorpe Museum
Brighton and Hove Museum
Canterbury Museum
Carlisle Museum and Art Gallery
Chantrey Bequest
Department of the Environment
Eastbourne Towner Gallery
Farendon Trust
Folkestone New Metropole Arts Centre
Kendall Museum
Maidstone Museum
Ministry of Works
Monte Carlo Museum
National Museum of Wales
Royal Academy of Arts
Salford Museum and Art Gallery
Southend Museum