Old Man of the Market
modeled and cast 1995
William Cumming created very few works of sculpture, which in retrospect seems odd considering that body language was the most expressive element in his paintings. This small bronze is a rarity. It is based directly on a tiny figure Cumming made and cast in 1985 for Marshall Hatch, but its source goes back decades earlier, to the drawings Cumming made of the denizens of Pike Place Market, when he worked alongside Mark Tobey there. John Braseth, who commissioned this larger version from the artist, recalls that Cumming talked about the fascination that the street people held for him and Tobey, especially with all able bodied men off at war and the market “in full depression mode,” as Braseth put it. Cumming told Braseth that Tobey had been fond of wearing hats on his sketching trips to the market, and since Cumming was fond of painting them as props in his paintings, he decided to add that crowning touch to this figure, too, as a quiet tribute to his friend.
Bronze
Gift of John Braseth in honor of Gordon Woodside
2012.20
Provenance: Commissioned by John Braseth, Seattle, ca. 1992
Photo: Elizabeth Mann
