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  Charles Conner

About the Artist | Art Images | Links

 
     
 

1884 Landscape

Considered as one of the most talented early Richmond artists, Charles Conner was not only an artist but also a musician. He played the coronet in the Conner Orchestra with his four older brothers, often playing solos. Self-taught, he began his career as an industrial painter for Hoosier Drill which later became International Harvester Company.

Conner became a close friend with John Bundy and began exhibiting his works along side the Richmond group artists. A true plein-air enthusiast, he would do much of his sketching and painting outdoors and would sleep in a tent for months recording the Fountain City landscape. In 1887, he moved to California with his brother Albert, also a painter. He spent the next eight years painting the Pacific Coast before he would return to Richmond. It was during this time that his painting improved immensely.

In 1904, Conner made a place for himself in the art world by having his masterpiece, “Wet Night in February” exhibited in the main hall of the St. Louis World’s Fair along side works by nationally recognized artists. This same work was the sensation in the great exhibition of Indiana art shown in Tomlinson Hall, Indianapolis in 1903. It was here that the work was selected for the World’s Fair. But it was an art jury that then selected it to hang in the prestigious Central Pavilion for thousands of visitors to see at the World’s Fair.

Yet despite his talent and recognition, the most Conner ever received in his lifetime for a work was $150. This work, “The Old Swimming Hole” was purchased in part by Indianapolis philanthropist, Emil Deitz and the school children of his hometown, Fountain City who collected $50 worth of pennies to purchase the work. The painting is still owned by the Northeastern Wayne School Corporation.

Tragically, he would die an early death in 1905. John Bundy considered him the best painter within the Richmond Group and one can only speculate what he might have accomplished artistically if he his life had not ended so early.

 
   
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November Day
Richmond Art Museum Collection ©-P

1884 Landscape
Wayne County
Historical Museum Collection
     
         
  Learn More About Charles Conner  
 

   
 

Born: 1857
Died: 1905

Preferred Media: Painting

Additional Information & Images:

Images

Sources:

  • Palladium-Item and Sun Telegram, September 28, 1967, “Old Swimmin Hole” Painting of Conner’s to be place in new Northeastern School.

  • Palladium-Item and Sun Telegram, January 13, 1958, Charles Conner, Artist For Early Implement Firm, Was Self-Taught.

  • Palladium-Item, March 1964; Conner Musicians and Artists Recalled. p.16.

  • ___The Richmond School; Presented by Jay County Arts Council and the Art Association of Richmond, September, 1985.

  • Newton, Judith Vale and Carol Weiss, A Grand Tradition: The Art and Artists of the Hoosier Salon, 1925-1990. Indianapolis, Indiana: Hoosier Salon Patrons Association, Inc., 1993.

  • Peat, Wilbur. Pioneer Painters of Indiana. Crawfordsville, Indiana: The Lakeside Press, 1954.


Photo Courtesy of the Richmond Art Museum
 
 

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