James McCray (1912 – 1993)

James McCray was born in Niles, Fremont, California, on October 1, 1912. In 1934-35 McCray received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from UC Berkeley. His first noted public art exhibition was in 1935 at the Oakland Art Gallery.

In 1937 McCray received a grant to study at the prestigious Barnes Foundation in Pennsylvania, and the following year the foundation awarded him a grant to study and travel in Europe. McCray would return to California in 1939 to work in the art department at UC Berkeley.

James McCray gained notoriety in 1940 when two of his works were exhibited in the Palace of Fine Arts exhibition at the Golden Gate International Exposition in San Francisco. That same year he received and was awarded Honorable Mention at the 60^th Annual Exhibition of the San Francisco Art Association.

In 1941 James McCray began teaching at the California School of Fine Arts (CSFA), now the San Francisco Art Institute. The school’s board of directors at the CSFA selected McCray to “introduce a new spirit of modernism in what had become a conservative, academic program.” McCray would appoint a colleague of his at the Barnes Foundation, Douglas MacAgy, to serve on the board of directors at CSFA. Under McCray’s and MacAgy’s influence, the faculty would hire Elmer Bischoff, Clifford Still, and David Park. After World War II, the school became a nucleus for Abstract Expressionism, with faculty including Clyfford Still, Ad Reinhardt, Mark Rothko, David Park, Elmer Bischoff, Richard Diebenkorn, and Clay Spohn.

During the mid-1940s, McCray had developed a distinctive style of geometric abstraction related to graphs, maps, and other kinds of diagrams. It was based on linear grids, irregular in size and interval that were played against small squares and rectangles of bright color and an occasional larger color plane intersected by diagonal lines in the manner of a mechanical drawing projection (Albright, Thomas. “Art in the San Francisco Bay Area 1945 – 1980“).

James McCray left CSFA in 1946, and in 1947 he was invited to re-join the Berkeley Art Department, where he remained until becoming professor emeritus in 1982. James McCray passed away in 1993 in Walnut Creek, California.

Education and Teaching
1934  University of California Berkeley, B.A.
1935  University of California Berkeley, M.A.
1936  University of California Berkeley, Teaching assistant to Worth Ryder, John Haley
1937  Barnes Foundation, Merion, PA
1937-1939  Barnes Foundation Grant to study and travel in Europe
1941-1946  California School of Fine Arts, San Francisco, CA
1946  1947  University of Washington, Pullman, WA
1947-1982  University of California Berkeley

Exhibitions and Awards
1935  Oakland Art Gallery, Oakland, CA
1937  57^th Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1939  Golden Gate International Exhibition, San Francisco, CA
1940  60^th Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1940  Golden Gate International Exhibition, San Francisco, CA
1942  62^nd Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1945  65^th Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1945  Awarded the Anne Bremer Memorial Prize for abstract painting.
1948  Eighth Annual Exhibition of American Paintings and Sculpture, Abstact and Surreal American Art, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
1949  68^th   Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1950  69^th  Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1955  74^th  Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1956  75^th  Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1957  76^th  Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1959  78^th  Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1960  79^th  Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1961  80^th  Annual Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, San Francisco Art Association at the San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
1962  Winter Invitational, California Palace of the Legion of Honor, San Francisco, CA
1963  Winter Invitational, California Palace of the Legion of Honor, San Francisco, CA
1964  Winter Invitational, California Palace of the Legion of Honor, San Francisco, CA
1965-1966  Salon de Realite, Paris, France

Literature
2005  AskART.com Inc. – Dunbier, Lonnie Pierson (Editor). The Artists Bluebook 34,000 North American Artists to March 2005
2005  Davenport, Ray. Davenport’s Art Reference: The Gold Edition
2002  Hughes, Edan Milton. Artists in California: 1786-1940 (Two Volumes)
2002  McClelland, Gordon T; Jay T. Last. California Watercolors 1850-1970, An Illustrated History & Biographical Dictionary
1999  Falk, Peter Hastings (Editor). Who Was Who in American Art, 1564-1975, 3 volumes
1998  Moure, Nancy Dustin Wall. California Art: 450 Years of Painting & Other Media
1991  Falk, Peter Hastings (Editor). The Annual & Biennial Exhibition Record of the Whitney Museum of Art (Exhibition catalog)
1990  Falk, Peter Hastings (Editor). The Annual Exhibition Record of the Art Institute of Chicago (Exhibition catalog)
1989  Hughes, Edan Milton. Artists in California, 1786-1940
1985  Albright, Thomas. Art in the San Francisco Bay Area 1945-1980/An Illustrated History
1985  Falk, Peter Hastings (Editor). Who Was Who in American Art: Artists Active Between 1898-1947
1984  Orr-Cahill, Christina. The Art of California Selected Works at the Oakland Museum
1976  San Francisco Mus Modern Art. Painting & Sculpture in California The Modern Era
1967  Howe, Thomas C. Painters Behind Painters An Exhibition of Central California Artists (Exhibition catalog)
1935  Mallett, Daniel Trowbridge. Index of Artists: International-Biographical Two Volumes: Includes 1940 Index

Museums (exhibited)
San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA
Legion of Honor (formerly The California Palace of the Legion of Honor), San Francisco, CA
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Metropolitan Museum, New York, NY
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
Phillips Memorial Gallery, Washington, DC
Salon de Realite, Paris, France

Sources:
University of California. Calisphere, UC Libraries
Edan Hughes, “Artists in California 1786-1940”
David Carlson, Carlson Gallery
askART.com

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