Gus Cummins RA (b. 1943)

Gus Cummins studied at Sutton School of Art from 1958 to 1961, Wimbledon School of Art from 1961 to 1964 (where he received a senior drawing prize) and subsequently at the Royal College of Art, London from 1964 to 1967.

He went on to teach at Hammersmith College of Art and Building, Sutton College of Liberal Arts and Croydon College of Art in the 1970’s and at Hastings College of Arts and Technology, Wimbledon School of Art and Ravensbourne College of Art and Communication in the 1980s. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s he taught at Chelsea School of Art and at City & Guilds of London Art School and during 2000 at the Prince’s Foundation. He has also been a tutor at the Royal Academy Schools since the late 1980s.

Gus Cummins’s first solo exhibition was held at the Gardener Arts Centre, Brighton in 1991. Several solo shows of his work have subsequently been exhibited at galleries including the Metropole Arts Centre, Folkestone in 1992 and the Lamont Gallery, London in 1995. His work has also been exhibited widely in group shows held throughout London since 1980, including exhibitions at the Mall Galleries, the National Portrait Gallery, the Festival Hall, Camden and Battersea Arts Centres and the Royal Academy, as well as many private galleries. He has also exhibited extensively within the UK and in Norway, Holland, the United Arab Emirates and the USA.

Among Cummins’s many awards are the Henry Moore Prize (London Group) (1982), second prize in the GLC Spirit of London Festival (1983). the Daler-Rowney Prize (Royal Academy, 1987), First Prize in the Hunting Group (1990, 1999), the House and Garden Prize and Blackstone Award (Royal Academy, 1992) and the Royal Watercolour Society Prize (Royal Academy, 2001).

Gus Cummins is a member of The London Group and was elected Royal Academician in 1992. He lives and works in Hastings.