The Cedar Rapids Museum of Art--Conger Metcalf

This week the Daily Palette is celebrating Conger Metcalf, an exhibition at the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art (CRMA). This show, which runs through May 11, 2014, celebrates the 100th anniversary of Metcalf's birth.

Conger Metcalf (1914-1998) was born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He studied at the Stone City Art Colony in Stone City, Iowa in the summers of 1932 and 1933. Later, he studied both art and music at Coe College, graduating with a degree in music in 1936. He continued his artistic education in Boston, graduating from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in 1941.

During his service in World War II, Metcalf spent time in Algeria, Naples, and Florence. His time abroad greatly influenced his art by exposing him to the work of European masters. After the war he established himself as an important artist in Boston where he taught art at various institutions, including Boston University.

Despite living in Massachusetts for most of his adult life, Metcalf maintained ties to Iowa. He taught a workshop and exhibited his work at Coe College, and he donated several of his paintings to various Iowa institutions. Coe College owns forty-five of his paintings and displays many of them in their Conger Metcalf Gallery.

As the paintings featured on the Daily Palette this week demonstrate, children were an important subject for Metcalf. His frames were also significant; he took many trips to Italy throughout his career to collect antique frames to use for his paintings.

(Sources: CRMA and "When Tillage Begins: The Stone City Art Colony and School")