A few months later, after the beginning of the Civil War, the family left there and returned to Ohio, eventually settling in Sandusky on the shores of Lake Erie where the elder Curran served as superintendent of schools.

Located in the scenic Shawangunk Mountains about 100 miles northwest of New York City, the spectacular scenery and native flora inspired Curran to build a summer home there.

[citation needed] While in Paris Curran enrolled at the Académie Julian[5] where he began to concentrate on new subject matter and experimented with a variety of painting styles.

Many of his pictures from this time were painted outdoors en plein air and features well dressed modern women enjoying a variety of leisure activities.

There Curran often used family members as models when he painted on the shores of Lake Erie, experimenting with a variety of artistic styles including impressionism, symbolism, tonalism and naturalism.

Charles Curran's work is represented in numerous museum collections, and his outdoor paintings of youthful women have remained popular with individual collectors.