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Ad Code: 3
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An example of work by August Charles Cook
Artwork images are copyright of the artist or assignee
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This biography from the Archives of AskART:
| August Charles Cook (1897-1990), was born in Philadelphia, the child of
a salesman and amateur artist (Charles Cook) and a mother who developed
an appreciation of fine furniture craftsmanship (Ann Buckley Cook).
His education included training at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art
(1917-1924), where he won its most prestigious award, the William Emlen
Cresson Memorial Travel Scholarship, in 1921. He also studied at
Harvard University.
At the Academy, he met Irma Virginia Howard, a native of Balston Spa,
N.Y., who also became a distinguished artist. An annual drawing
award of The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts honors both the
Cooks and their revered instructor, Daniel Garber.
The two were married in Valley Forge in 1924 before moving
to Spartanburg, S.C., where August took a position teaching at Converse
College. He had been a student of fine art at the Academy and
educated himself in advance of teaching art history, before which time
he had never studied the subject.
Cook's tenure established the first art major area of study at the college, where he taught for 42 years.
After his retirement in the 1960s, he purchased some 90 acres of land
in rural Spartanburg County near the Pacolet River. The land
included an old farm house, which he renovated to become a rustic
studio. There he taught art privately through his eighties.
He lived independently to the age of 93, and died in Spartanburg
Regional Hospital.
Cook's distinguishing contribution to his generation of artists is his
woodcut engravings, executed finely enough to be mistaken for
etchings. He was also a master of oil painting, considered
himself a "colorist," and was an accomplished cabinet maker, having
learned the craft from his father or grandfather. He mined local
clay from his Spartanburg County property and using a rustic kickwheel
of his own creation, threw pottery pieces that he then used in his own
still lifes and in teaching. He also made carved and gilted frames for his artwork.
“Cook’s study of wood engraving included an in-depth consideration of
its history including its use as illustration from the 15th century
onward. He observed that the development of photography at the
end of the 19th century spelled the end to commericial wood engraving.
A few stalwart engravers persisted, such as Thomas Cole, and a handful
of other artists dedicated tot he process. Cook had heard Cole
lecture and had been much impressed.” – from a June 3, 1993, press
release of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
August Cook’s work has been shown at the Library of Congress, the
Carnegie Institute of Technology, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art,
the South Carolina State Museum and Audubon Artists. His work is
included in the public collections in the Library of Congress ("Summer
in the Mountains" [1948]); the Boston Museum of Art; the South Carolina
State Art Collection; the Carnegie Institute of Technology and the
Butler Museum of Art, Youngstown, Ohio.
He is listed in Who's Who in American Art-1973 (Jaques Cattell Press), Contemporary Artists of South Carolina; Jack Morris and Robert Smeltz; and Who's Who in American Art-1947.
Submitted February 2007 by Sally Cook Parsons, granddaughter of the artist
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Biography from Spartanburg Art Museum:
| August Cook: 1897 - 1990.
He was born in Philadelphia and graduated from The Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. In 1924, he moved to Spartanburg, SC after his marriage to Irma Howard. He became the first Art Department Chair at Converse College in Spartanburg, SC. Retiring after forty-two years, he then taught private lessons until his death.
He is best known for his oil portraits, South Carolina landscapes, wood-block prints and hand-carved frames.
He received many awards and exhibited widely during his lifetime.
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