VONN CUMMINGS SUMNER

Vonn Cummings Sumner grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, the son of a picture framer and a school teacher. Seeing the art that his father was framing, as well as travel in Europe, Central America and India shaped Vonn’s visual aesthetic during his formative years. He attended the University of California, at Davis, where he earned both a Bachelor’s degree and an M.F.A., with highest honors. While at Davis he worked closely with celebrated painter and educator Wayne Thiebaud, both as a student and as a teaching assistant. Upon graduating in 2000, Vonn moved to New York, where he painted and worked in museums, including the Guggenheim. In 2002, he moved to the Los Angeles area, where he currently lives and works.

Vonn's work has been exhibited nationally and internationally since 1998. He has been featured/reviewed in publications including New American Paintings, Elle Décor, Hyperallergic, Hi Fructose, San Francisco Chronicle, The Washington Post, The Huffington Post, L.A. Weekly, The Painter's Table, Le Monde Diplomatique, and many others. His work has been the subject of two solo museum shows: at the Riverside Art Museum in California, and the Phillips Museum of Art in Pennsylvania. In 2021, Vonn was featured in the first museum survey tracing the influence of Wayne Thiebaud on contemporary artists (Wayne Thiebaud Influencer: A New Generation) at the Manetti Shrem Museum of Art on the campus of the University of California, Davis.

He is a Professor of Art at Fullerton College in Southern California.