John Steuart Curry

John Steuart Curry (Born November 14, 1897, Dunavant, Kansas--Died August 29, 1946, Madison, Wisconsin)

Curry, a regionalist artist, captured classic images of the American scene, especially fertile landscapes of the Midwest, small towns and farms. His art education came from the Kansas City Art Institute and the Art Institute of Chicago. In 1936, Curry accepted a teaching position with the University of Wisconsin in Madison. In 1937 Curry began the mural he is best known for, The Tragic Prelude, the idyllic contemporary image of abolitionist John Brown painted on the walls of the Capitol in Topeka, Kansas. Reaction to Curry's mural was much less than heraldic. Kansans pointed out all of the mistakes Curry made in the mural. Leaving his home state in 1941, dejected and heart-broken, Curry returned to Wisconsin and his teaching. Five years later John Steuart Curry died of a heart attack at his home in Madison, Wisconsin; all the while, Curry's widow maintains that the 48 year-old artist's demise was contributed to the abuse he suffered while painting the Capitol murals. Curry returned to Kansas forever with burial at the Reformed Presbyterian Church Cemetery in Winchester.

John Steuart Curry Manhunt Lithograph (C. E. Denman Collection)