Frank William Cuprien (1871-1948)
Frank Cuprien is one of Southern California’s most well-known painters. His poetically soft and colorful images of the Laguna Coast at sunset have brought to him notoriety with collectors and scholars. Born in Brooklyn, New York in 1871, he began his studies there and at the Art Students League and the Cooper Institute. Later he studied in Philadelphia. For a time he pursued a simultaneous career in music and studied in Munich and Paris.The turn of the twentieth century found him in Texas, and he eventually settled in southern California, lured by the legendarily beautiful scenery he aimed to capture in his canvases. Briefly staying in Catalina, he finally settled in Laguna where he was to remain for the rest of his life. He led a rather bohemian lifestyle and his home overlooking the ocean became a gathering place for the early painters and musicians of a new art colony. He died in 1948, leaving a beautiful legacy on canvas of the coastal waters off the beaches of southern California.
biographical note courtesy of Charlton Hall Auctions.