Charles Csuri (July 4, 1922 – February 27, 2022), better known as Chuck Csuri, was an American artist and

computer art Computer art is art in which computers play a role in the production or display of the artwork. Such art can be an image, sound, animation, video, CD-ROM, DVD-ROM, video game, website, algorithm, performance or gallery installation. Many traditio ...

creator, described by the '' Smithsonian'' magazine as the "father of

digital art Digital art, or the digital arts, is artistic work that uses Digital electronics, digital technology as part of the creative or presentational process. It can also refer to computational art that uses and engages with digital media. Since the 1960 ...

and

computer animation Computer animation is the process used for digitally generating Film, moving images. The more general term computer-generated imagery (CGI) encompasses both still images and moving images, while computer animation refers to moving images. Virtu ...

Biography

Digital art

Csuri created his first digital art pieces in 1964, and was quickly recognized by the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...

(MoMA) and the Association for Computing Machinery Special Interest Group Graphics (ACM SIGGRAPH). In particular, his 1967 short film ''Hummingbird'', a collaboration with James Shaffer, is in MoMa's permanent collection as one of the earliest surviving examples of computer animation. Csuri taught for over forty years at

Ohio State University The Ohio State University (Ohio State or OSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio, United States. A member of the University System of Ohio, it was founded in 1870. It is one ...

, and between 1971 and 1987 established a series of groundbreaking graphics research centers there: the Computer Graphics Research Group, the Ohio Supercomputer Graphics Project, and

Cranston/Csuri Productions Cranston/Csuri Productions (CCP) was an American computer animation company based in Columbus, Ohio. It was founded in 1981 by artist Chuck Csuri and investor Robert Cranston Kanuth to commercially exploit computer animation technology created by ...

, which spun off from the university in 1981 to become one of the world's first computer animation production companies. In 1987, these groups combined to form the Advanced Computing Center for Arts and Design (ACCAD), which remains in operation as of 2025. In 2000, Csuri received an Ohio Governor's Award for the Arts and Ohio State's Sullivant Medal, the institution's highest honor, in acknowledgement of his lifetime achievements. A retrospective exhibit of seventy of Csuri's artworks, titled ''Beyond Boundaries'', traveled to museums throughout Europe and Asia in 2010. Other notable works by Csuri include ''Random War'' (1967), ''Sine Curve Man'' (1967), ''Wondrous Spring'' (1992), ''Spinning'' (1994), ''A Happy Time'' (1996), ''Random War Pics'' (2013), ''Despair'' (2016), ''Doddle'' (2016), ''Old Age'' (2016), and ''ribFIG'' (2016).

College football career

Csuri attended Ohio State on a football scholarship. He became captain of their first national championship football team, and is in the

College Football Hall of Fame The College Football Hall of Fame is a hall of fame and interactive Tourist attraction, attraction devoted to college football, college American football. The National Football Foundation (NFF) founded the Hall in 1951 to immortalize the players ...

MVP MVP most commonly refers to: * Most valuable player, an award, typically for the best performing player in a sport or competition * Minimum viable product, a concept for feature estimating used in business and engineering MVP may also refer to: ...

in the 1942

Big Ten Conference The Big Ten Conference (stylized B1G, formerly the Western Conference and the Big Nine Conference, among others) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference in the United States. Founded as the Intercollegiate Conference of Fa ...

. He was selected in the

1944 NFL draft The 1944 NFL draft was held on April 19, 1944, at the Warwick Hotel in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Perhaps as a tip of the hat to wartime sensibilities, the 1944 draft was officially called the "1943 Preferred Negotiations List" by the league. ...

by the

Chicago Cardinals The professional American football team now known as the Arizona Cardinals previously played in Chicago, Illinois, as the Chicago Cardinals from 1898 to 1959 before relocating to St. Louis, Missouri, for the 1960 through 1987 seasons. Roots ca ...

(16th round, 154th overall pick), but declined the offer in order to serve in

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

Military service

Csuri served in the

U.S. Army The United States Army (USA) is the primary land service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution.Article II, section 2, clause 1 of the United Stat ...

from 1943 to 1946, receiving the

Bronze Star The Bronze Star Medal (BSM) is a United States Armed Forces decoration awarded to members of the United States Armed Forces for either heroic achievement, heroic service, meritorious achievement, or meritorious service in a combat zone. Wh ...

in 1945 for heroism in the

Battle of the Bulge The Battle of the Bulge, also known as the Ardennes Offensive or Unternehmen Die Wacht am Rhein, Wacht am Rhein, was the last major German Offensive (military), offensive Military campaign, campaign on the Western Front (World War II), Western ...

Teaching career

Csuri returned to Ohio State and completed his MA in art in 1948. In 1949, he joined the faculty of the Department of Art at the university. He became a full Professor of Art Education in 1978, a Professor of Computer Information Science in 1986, and Professor Emeritus in 1990.

Personal life

Csuri was born in

Grant Town, West Virginia Grant Town is a town in Marion County, West Virginia, Marion County, West Virginia, in the eastern United States. The population was 690 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census. The town was formed in 1901 with the opening of the Federal C ...

, on July 4, 1922, to parents from

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

. He grew up in

Cleveland Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located along the southern shore of Lake Erie, it is situated across the Canada–U.S. maritime border and approximately west of the Ohio-Pennsylvania st ...

Ohio Ohio ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Erie to the north, Pennsylvania to the east, West Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Indiana to the ...

. He died in

Lakewood Ranch, Florida Lakewood Ranch is a planned community and census-designated place (CDP) in southeastern Manatee County and northeastern Sarasota County, Florida, United States, consisting of approximately . It is part of the North Port-Bradenton-Sarasota, Flor ...

, on February 27, 2022, at the age of 99.

References

External links

*
Oral history interview with Charles A. Csuri

Charles Babbage Institute The IT History Society (ITHS) is an organization that supports the history and scholarship of information technology by encouraging, fostering, and facilitating archival and historical research. Formerly known as the Charles Babbage Foundation, ...

, University of Minnesota. Csuri recounts his art education and explains his transition to computer graphics in the mid-1960s.
The Charles A. Csuri Project at the Ohio State University

Charles Csuri's profile at Siggraph
* Fitzsimmons, Kevin. "Gov. Taft recognizes OSU's Csuri as the state's best individual artist". OnCampus Online, Vol. 29, No. 18. https://web.archive.org/web/20110929232136/http://oncampus.osu.edu/v29n18/thisissue_6.html * Gold, Virginia. "ACM SIGGRAPH ANNOUNCES WINNER OF 2011 AWARD FOR LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT IN DIGITAL ART". The Association for Computing Machinery, https://web.archive.org/web/20110927055828/http://accad.osu.edu/assets/files/Csuri_SIGGAward2011.pdf {{DEFAULTSORT:Csuri, Charles 1922 births 2022 deaths American digital artists Artists from West Virginia Computer graphics professionals Ohio State Buckeyes football players Ohio State University faculty United States Army personnel of World War II United States Army soldiers Sportspeople from Marion County, West Virginia Military personnel from West Virginia People from Grant Town, West Virginia