One of the Academy's most involved members, Charles Courtney Curran spent his childhood in Sandusky, Ohio, where his father, an amateur painter, was superintendent of schools. After graduating from high school, Curran worked briefly in an insurance office, then enrolled in 1880 at the Cincinnati (Ohio) School of Design. By 1883 he had moved to New York City to continue his studies. He became a pupil in the studio of Walter Satterlee, attended the National Academy's antique class from 1884 to 1886, and received further training at the Art Students League. Although still a student, Curran gained a certain reputation when the Academy accepted one of his paintings for inclusion in the annual exhibition of 1883. His work then appeared in every annual until his death, a remarkable six decades of consistent exhibition.
When Curran left for study abroad in 1888, he had already received the Academy's Julius Hallgarten Prize and been elected an Associate of the Academy as well as a member of the Society of American Artists. Newly married to Grace W. Wickham, who later became the Academy's librarian, he enrolled at the Académie Julian and worked under Jean-Joseph Benjamin-Constant, Henri-Lucien Doucet, and Jules-Joseph Lefebvre. He later confessed, however, that P. A. J. Dagnan-Bouveret had been his greatest influence (Dreiser, 227). After two and a half years abroad Curran returned to New York, where he painted portraits, landscapes, and genre scenes. Although he was not elected an Academician until 1904, the Academy honored him with the Thomas B. Clarke Prize in 1893 and a second Julius Hallgarten Prize in 1895.
In 1901, after returning from a trip to Switzerland and Paris, where he had served on the [Query unanswered: its formal name?:] U.S. Art Commission to the 1900 Exposition Universelle, Curran began teaching at the Pratt Institute, Brooklyn. At different times, he was also on the faculties of the Cooper Union and the Art Students League, both in New York. However, it was in the Academy school, where he taught from 1917 to 1942, that he wielded greatest influence. As an instructor in the life class, he encouraged students to draw from the human body at the outset, without having necessarily obtained proficiency in drawing from antique casts.
In 1904 Curran spent his first summer at the artists' colony in Cragsmoor, New York. He soon became an active member of the community, serving as deacon of the Episcopal church and performing in amateur theatrical productions. In Cragsmoor he developed his characteristic composition, in which female figures are placed on a cliff and silhouetted against an expansive sky. His daughters were often the models for these paintings.
During his last years Curran traveled to the South, to Europe, and in 1936 to China. He also was occupied with affairs of the National Academy. He served as an officer continuously from 1910 until his death, initially as recording secretary and from 1920 as corresponding secretary. In 1935 the Academy celebrated Curran's seventy-fifth birthday by presenting him with an album of drawings and messages from members; it was published in facsimile in 1975.
