Mitzi Cunliffe
Encyclopedia
Mitzi Solomon Cunliffe was an American
sculptor. She was most famous for designing the golden trophy in the shape of a theatrical mask that would go on to represent the British Academy of Film and Television Arts
and be presented as the BAFTA award. She also produced textiles, ceramics, and jewellery.
. She attended the Art Students League of New York
from 1930 to 1933 and read Fine Arts and Fine Arts Education at Columbia University
from 1935 to 1940, receiving a BSc in 1939 and an MA in 1940.
Upon graduation, she moved to Paris
where she studied at the Académie Colarossi
for a year. After viewing the western side of Cathedral of Chartres
, she settled on becoming an architectural sculptor. Following this she studied for a period in Sweden
. Her early works, of free-standing figures, were admired by Le Corbusier
. She was awarded the Widener Gold Medal
by the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.
In 1949, she met and married British academic Marcus Cunliffe
. He was a lecturer at Manchester University, and she moved with him to Didsbury
. They had a son and two daughters (one of whom is Shay Cunliffe, CDG Award-winning costume designer). They were divorced in 1971.
, noted industrial designer, for a new fleet of ships called "4 Aces
" for American Export Lines.
Her first large scale commission was two pieces for the Festival of Britain
in 1951. One, known as "Root Bodied Forth", shows figures emerging from a tree, and was displayed at the entrance of the Festival. The second, a pair of bronze handles in the form of hands, adorned the Regatta Restaurant. She created a similar piece, in the form of knots, in 1952 which remains at the School of Civic Design at Liverpool University.
Heaton Park
pumping station
was built in 1955, for which Cunliffe was commissioned to design and craft a relief panel which depicts the water being brought from Haweswater
to Manchester
. It has been described as "a remarkable piece of public art on ... a mundane industrial building". The building was listed in 1998 as a "complete work of art", the only such listing for any building built after 1945. That year, she was also commissioned to create the BAFTA mask for the Guild of Television Producers and Directors (which merged with the British Film Academy in 1958 to form the Society of Film and Television Arts, renamed the British Academy of Film and Television Arts in 1976).
She created a large pierced screen for the restaurant at Lewis's
department store in Liverpool in 1957. She bought the piece when the Restaurant closed in 1986, and moved it to her home at Seillans
in the south of France. She also designed textiles for David Whitehead
and Tootal Broadhurst, and ceramics for Pilkington
.
In the 1950-60s Mitzi Cunliffe developed in Manchester (UK) sculptures consisting of multiple blocks about twelve inches square which she put together in a variety of combinations to give a sculptured effect on a large scale. She referred to them as modular sculptures. Some of these works were acquired by the University of Manchester
and the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST). Interestingly, in the same studio at 18 Cranmer Road, Greek artist http://www.LLLarts.comLeda Luss Luyken
] explored a similar principle of variable modularity
in the arts in her ModulArt
paintings of the 1980s.
Cunliffe developed a technique for mass-producing abstract designs in relief in concrete, as architectural decoration, which she described as "sculpture by the yard". She used the technique to decorate buildings throughout the UK, but particularly in and around Manchester
.
Her last major architectural commission was the creation of four carved stone panels for Scottish Life House on Cheapside
in the City of London
in 1970.
) from 1971 to 1976, and then at the Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies
and the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York, the University of Pennsylvania
, and Concordia University in Montreal
.
She later developed Alzheimer's disease
, and retired to Oxford
, but she remained in the public eye. Her designs were included in an exhibition of Public Sculpture held in Leeds at the Henry Moore Institute in the autumn of 1999. Her final exhibition took place in Oxford
in 2001, where her work was included with other artists suffering from Alzheimer's. Her daughter Antonia named an annual prize (1994 to 2007) in her honour for a sculpture student at the Ruskin School of Drawing at Oxford University.
She died at her nursing home in Oxfordshire
, two days before her 89th birthday. She is survived by her three children.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
sculptor. She was most famous for designing the golden trophy in the shape of a theatrical mask that would go on to represent the British Academy of Film and Television Arts
British Academy of Film and Television Arts
The British Academy of Film and Television Arts is a charity in the United Kingdom that hosts annual awards shows for excellence in film, television, television craft, video games and forms of animation.-Introduction:...
and be presented as the BAFTA award. She also produced textiles, ceramics, and jewellery.
Early life
Cunliffe was born Mitzi Solomon in New YorkNew York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
. She attended the Art Students League of New York
Art Students League of New York
The Art Students League of New York is an art school located on West 57th Street in New York City. The League has historically been known for its broad appeal to both amateurs and professional artists, and has maintained for over 130 years a tradition of offering reasonably priced classes on a...
from 1930 to 1933 and read Fine Arts and Fine Arts Education at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
from 1935 to 1940, receiving a BSc in 1939 and an MA in 1940.
Upon graduation, she moved to Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
where she studied at the Académie Colarossi
Académie Colarossi
The Académie Colarossi is an art school founded by the Italian sculptor Filippo Colarossi. First located on the Île de la Cité, it moved in the 1870s to 10 rue de la Grande-Chaumière in the VIe arrondissement of Paris, France....
for a year. After viewing the western side of Cathedral of Chartres
Cathedral of Chartres
The French medieval Cathedral of Our Lady of Chartres is a Latin Rite Catholic cathedral located in Chartres, about southwest of Paris, is considered one of the finest examples of the French High Gothic style...
, she settled on becoming an architectural sculptor. Following this she studied for a period in Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
. Her early works, of free-standing figures, were admired by Le Corbusier
Le Corbusier
Charles-Édouard Jeanneret, better known as Le Corbusier , was a Swiss-born French architect, designer, urbanist, writer and painter, famous for being one of the pioneers of what now is called modern architecture. He was born in Switzerland and became a French citizen in 1930...
. She was awarded the Widener Gold Medal
Widener Gold Medal
The George D. Widener Memorial Gold Medal was an award for sculpture established in 1912 by the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.The award recognizes the "most meritorious work of Sculpture modeled by an American citizen and shown in the Annual Exhibition"...
by the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.
In 1949, she met and married British academic Marcus Cunliffe
Marcus Cunliffe
Marcus Cunliffe was a British scholar who specialized in American Studies, especially military and cultural history. Cunliffe stressed the powerful influence of Americans' cultural beliefs about their own natural military capacity, reinforced by a latent dislike of military professionals, on the...
. He was a lecturer at Manchester University, and she moved with him to Didsbury
Didsbury
Didsbury is a suburban area of the City of Manchester, in Greater Manchester, England. It lies on the north bank of the River Mersey, south of Manchester city centre, in the southern half of the Greater Manchester Urban Area...
. They had a son and two daughters (one of whom is Shay Cunliffe, CDG Award-winning costume designer). They were divorced in 1971.
Works
As early as 1944, Mitzi had created the first of two marble sculptures — a 32 inches (812.8 mm) winged female figure in red Spanish marble entitled "harp-form" — under commission from Henry DreyfussHenry Dreyfuss
Henry Dreyfuss was an American industrial designer.-Career:Dreyfuss was a native of Brooklyn, New York. As one of the celebrity industrial designers of the 1930s and 1940s, Dreyfuss dramatically improved the look, feel, and usability of dozens of consumer products...
, noted industrial designer, for a new fleet of ships called "4 Aces
Four Aces
The 4 Aces is the quartet of passenger-cargo liners Excalibur, Exochorda, Exeter, and Excambion, originally built for American Export Lines by New York Shipbuilding of Camden, New Jersey between 1929 and 1931...
" for American Export Lines.
Her first large scale commission was two pieces for the Festival of Britain
Festival of Britain
The Festival of Britain was a national exhibition in Britain in the summer of 1951. It was organised by the government to give Britons a feeling of recovery in the aftermath of war and to promote good quality design in the rebuilding of British towns and cities. The Festival's centrepiece was in...
in 1951. One, known as "Root Bodied Forth", shows figures emerging from a tree, and was displayed at the entrance of the Festival. The second, a pair of bronze handles in the form of hands, adorned the Regatta Restaurant. She created a similar piece, in the form of knots, in 1952 which remains at the School of Civic Design at Liverpool University.
Heaton Park
Heaton Park
Heaton Park, covering an area variously reported as , 247 hectares, , over and is the biggest park in Greater Manchester, England and one of the biggest municipal parks in Europe. The park comprises the grounds of a Grade I listed, neoclassical 18th century country house, Heaton Hall...
pumping station
Pumping station
Pumping stations are facilities including pumps and equipment for pumping fluids from one place to another. They are used for a variety of infrastructure systems, such as the supply of water to canals, the drainage of low-lying land, and the removal of sewage to processing sites.A pumping station...
was built in 1955, for which Cunliffe was commissioned to design and craft a relief panel which depicts the water being brought from Haweswater
Haweswater Reservoir
Haweswater is a reservoir in the English Lake District, built in the valley of Mardale in the county of Cumbria. The controversial construction of the Haweswater dam started in 1929, after Parliament passed an Act giving the Manchester Corporation permission to build the reservoir to supply water...
to Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
. It has been described as "a remarkable piece of public art on ... a mundane industrial building". The building was listed in 1998 as a "complete work of art", the only such listing for any building built after 1945. That year, she was also commissioned to create the BAFTA mask for the Guild of Television Producers and Directors (which merged with the British Film Academy in 1958 to form the Society of Film and Television Arts, renamed the British Academy of Film and Television Arts in 1976).
She created a large pierced screen for the restaurant at Lewis's
Lewis's
Lewis's was a large department store in Liverpool city centre. It was formerly the flagship of a chain of department stores under the Lewis's name, that operated from 1856 to 1991, when the company went into administration. Several stores in the chain were bought by the company Owen Owen and...
department store in Liverpool in 1957. She bought the piece when the Restaurant closed in 1986, and moved it to her home at Seillans
Seillans
Seillans is a commune in the Var department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in southeastern France.It is a ville perché overlooking the plain between the southern Alps and the Esterel, which borders the sea between Cannes and Saint-Raphaël...
in the south of France. She also designed textiles for David Whitehead
David Whitehead
David Adie Whitehead CBE, DSO & Bar, MC was an Australian Army officer who fought in both World War I and World War II and rose to the rank of brigadier.-Biography:...
and Tootal Broadhurst, and ceramics for Pilkington
Pilkington
Pilkington Group Limited is a multinational glass manufacturing company headquartered in St Helens, United Kingdom. It is a subsidiary of the Japan-based NSG Group...
.
In the 1950-60s Mitzi Cunliffe developed in Manchester (UK) sculptures consisting of multiple blocks about twelve inches square which she put together in a variety of combinations to give a sculptured effect on a large scale. She referred to them as modular sculptures. Some of these works were acquired by the University of Manchester
University of Manchester
The University of Manchester is a public research university located in Manchester, United Kingdom. It is a "red brick" university and a member of the Russell Group of research-intensive British universities and the N8 Group...
and the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST). Interestingly, in the same studio at 18 Cranmer Road, Greek artist http://www.LLLarts.comLeda Luss Luyken
Leda Luss Luyken
Leda Luss Luyken, née Valata, , Greece, is a Greek | American conceptual artist who lives and works in Germany.- Biography :...
] explored a similar principle of variable modularity
Modularity
Modularity is a general systems concept, typically defined as a continuum describing the degree to which a system’s components may be separated and recombined. It refers to both the tightness of coupling between components, and the degree to which the “rules” of the system architecture enable the...
in the arts in her ModulArt
ModulArt
Modular art is art created by joining together standardized units to form larger, more complex compositions. In some works the units can be subsequently moved, removed and added to – that is, modulated – to create a new work of art, different from the original or ensuing configurations.- Origins...
paintings of the 1980s.
Cunliffe developed a technique for mass-producing abstract designs in relief in concrete, as architectural decoration, which she described as "sculpture by the yard". She used the technique to decorate buildings throughout the UK, but particularly in and around Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
.
Her last major architectural commission was the creation of four carved stone panels for Scottish Life House on Cheapside
Cheapside
Cheapside is a street in the City of London that links Newgate Street with the junction of Queen Victoria Street and Mansion House Street. To the east is Mansion House, the Bank of England, and the major road junction above Bank tube station. To the west is St. Paul's Cathedral, St...
in the City of London
City of London
The City of London is a small area within Greater London, England. It is the historic core of London around which the modern conurbation grew and has held city status since time immemorial. The City’s boundaries have remained almost unchanged since the Middle Ages, and it is now only a tiny part of...
in 1970.
Later life and death
Cunliffe suffered from arthritis and eye problems in later life. She gave up sculpture to teach at Thames Polytechnic (which later became London South Bank UniversityLondon South Bank University
London South Bank University is a university in south London. With over 25,000 students and 1,700 staff, it is based in the London Borough of Southwark, near the South Bank of the River Thames, from which it takes its name...
) from 1971 to 1976, and then at the Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies
The Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies
The Institute for Architecture & Urban Studies is a non-profit Architecture Studio & think-tank located in Manhattan, New York, USA.-IAUS :...
and the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York, the University of Pennsylvania
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...
, and Concordia University in Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
.
She later developed Alzheimer's disease
Alzheimer's disease
Alzheimer's disease also known in medical literature as Alzheimer disease is the most common form of dementia. There is no cure for the disease, which worsens as it progresses, and eventually leads to death...
, and retired to Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
, but she remained in the public eye. Her designs were included in an exhibition of Public Sculpture held in Leeds at the Henry Moore Institute in the autumn of 1999. Her final exhibition took place in Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
in 2001, where her work was included with other artists suffering from Alzheimer's. Her daughter Antonia named an annual prize (1994 to 2007) in her honour for a sculpture student at the Ruskin School of Drawing at Oxford University.
She died at her nursing home in Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire
Oxfordshire is a county in the South East region of England, bordering on Warwickshire and Northamptonshire , Buckinghamshire , Berkshire , Wiltshire and Gloucestershire ....
, two days before her 89th birthday. She is survived by her three children.