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Sumerian Source

Creator: Cumming, James William Hunter, RSA · 1922-1991

The poet George Bruce, writing in Jack Firth's 1996 monograph on Cumming stated;

"Simply to accept these delicate formal shapes, separated by yet more delicate lines, observing the linear interest in each drawing in its box - presumably semaphoring signals unknown to us - is sufficient to yield pleasure. But the artist has entitled the painting 'Sumerian Source.' This puts it in the context of Cumming's major concern, a search for the beginnings of life, to which he gives his response in paint. Here, his curiosity is in the first symbolic written language, and in the signs man made for this communication. The spring of this pursuit was Cuming's visit to the Lascaux caves where the ancient animal forms could be considered as pictorial writing. Thus early tribes gave coherence to life. The Sumerians, however, abstracted the line from representation to express themselves in writing, and in doing so, gave dignity to life.

painted with great care, here is matter not to puzzle, but to refine perception. The rectangles enclosing the symbols firmly but delicately are lined out in white with the finest-tipped brush."