Charles Phillip Cross, 89, Portrait artist; one subject was U.S. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren
Shrike!
Portraitist's subjects included Earl Warren
By Claire Martin
Denver Post Staff Writer
09/25/2006
http://www.denverpost.com/obituaries/ci_4395803
http://extras.mnginteractive.com/live/media/site36/2006/0925/20060925_092310_BZ26_cross_GALLERY.jpg
Charles Cross painted this self-portrait. He died Sept. 1.
Portrait artist Charles Phillip Cross, who died Sept. 1 at age 89 in
Loveland, took a catholic approach to his subjects, who ranged from
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren to convicted murderer Arlo
Looking Cloud.
The son of a Maryland couple who ran a chicken farm, Cross learned as
a child to seek the distinguishing features that separated one chicken
from another or one person from a crowd.
"Each is such an individual in his own right, and capturing the
essence of my subject on canvas is an ongoing challenge," he told the
Loveland Reporter-Herald in February.
At age 9, Cross began experimenting with caricatures that did not
always sit well with the friends and neighbors interpreted on his
sketch pad. He discovered that the advantage of cartoons - calling
attention to foibles that many prefer to subdue - is also their drawback.
In high school, he attempted his first portrait, depicting himself in
tones of black and white, against a green background. Cross found
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the result dismal but decided to pursue a career in art anyway.
As an undergraduate and graduate student, he studied at the Maryland
Institute of Fine Art, interrupting his education to serve as a first
lieutenant of a field artillery unit in the European theater of World
War II.
He returned to the Maryland Institute of Fine Art and taught there for
15 years. A commissioned portrait of a department head at nearby Johns
Hopkins University launched his portraiture vocation.
The gentry Cross was hired to paint included the five founders of the
University of Los Angeles Medical Center, some Nebraska state
legislators, nine Methodist bishops, Western rabbi Edgar F. Magnin and
Earl Warren, then governor of California. The Warren portrait
commemorates the moment Warren signed legislation designating the UCLA
Medical Center.
Even more memorable, said Cross' wife, Marilyn, were his three
paintings of a child murdered by a drug addict. Commissioned by the
child's grandfather, a family friend, Cross worked from photographs to
create a portrait of the girl as an infant, a toddler and as she
appeared a few days before her death.
"I could not look at those paintings - they were too lifelike,"
Marilyn Cross said.
"But the family absolutely loved them, as live memories of her."
In 1982, Cross and his wife moved to Nebraska, where Cross focused on
Western art and landscapes. He painted ranch hands at work, cowboys,
American Indians, cattle, landscapes that conveyed both grace and
austerity, and four cowboy images for the Boulder Leanin' Tree card
company.
Cross and his family moved to Loveland in 1987. He taught at the
Loveland Academy of Fine Arts.
Besides his wife, survivors include stepdaughter Robin Parsons of
Harrison, N.Y.; stepson Mark Parsons of San Francisco; and two
grandchildren. His first wife, a brother and a sister preceded him in
death.
--
Wanna buy some mandies, Bob?