SwissArtGallery · Documented identity
Philip Campbell Curtis, an American painter associated with Surrealism and magical realism without fully identifying with these categories, was born on 26 May 1907 in Jackson, Michigan. After beginning law studies at the University of Michigan in spring 1930, he enrolled at the Yale School of Fine Arts in autumn 1932. There, he received a classical education focused on painting and drawing from the model, under Francis Taylor, Eugene Savage and Lewis York. According to Heather Lineberry, his work took a surrealist direction only after his arrival in Arizona in 1937; Curtis nevertheless remained ambivalent about these labels, at times identifying with them and at other times distinguishing himself from them.
Having settled in New York in 1935, he became assistant supervisor of the Manhattan mural-painting project run by the Federal Arts Program of the Works Progress Administration (WPA), where he worked alongside Stuart Davis, Arshile Gorky and Yasuo Kuniyoshi, among others. In 1937, the WPA sent him to Phoenix to create an arts centre, which became the Phoenix Art Museum, and then to Des Moines to launch the Des Moines Art Center. After the WPA ended in 1941, Curtis began a museum administration programme at Harvard’s Fogg Museum; his studies were interrupted by the Second World War, during which he served in Washington with the Office of Strategic Services.
In his practice, he painted, among other supports, on plywood or Masonite panels prepared by Janie Ellis with a layer of gesso; most of his paintings are varnished. From 1960, Sandra Kempner made his frames, seeking unusual materials to bring out the qualities of the paintings. The interests and activities of the Ellis family sometimes informed figures, situations or details in his paintings; Racheal’s costumes, in particular, appear in them. An initial exhibition of his work is recorded in San Francisco in 1949, followed by a presentation at the Coe Kerr Gallery in New York in October 1970. In 1992, he was named an Arizona Historymaker as part of the first group designated by the Arizona Historical League.
This profile brings together identity references for Philip Campbell Curtis and paintings, drawings and works on paper documented in auction catalogues.
1 references are documented at Dobiaschofsky. Each record links to its source; the amounts are not a general valuation of the artist’s work.
Oil on hardboard
"Girl with a hoop".
Öl auf Hartplatte
Catalogue period : 2018-11-09
Published result : 9000 CHF
Fees not specified in the available data
Estimate : CHF 12000
View the lot at the auction house ↗SwissArtGallery documentary note based on the cited sources. Titles, media and qualifications are provided in the profile language; the original catalogue wording remains available in each record.
Documentation updated : 2026-10-19
