THE ARTS
The WPA Arts Project by Jeanette Hendler
 MILTON AVERY "The Baby" |
 MARK ROTHKO "Black on Blue" |
>>>>>>Artists such as Milton Avery, Stuart Davis, Mark Rothko, Willem deKooning and Jackson Pollock were just a few of the thousands of artists on the WPA Project who have achieved worldwide recognition. Many, many other artists, who were also on the project, such as Aaron Berkman, Jules Halfant, MaxArthur Cohn, Norman Barr and Gertrude Shibley are in museum collections, exhibitions and are in many private collections, but are not as yet nationally known.
>>>>>W.P.A. was the abbreviation for the WORKS PROGRESS ADMINISTRATION, a government funded arts program which had an artists division. The artists who participated in the WPA ranged from figurative and academic, all the way to abstraction and surrealism, in addition to almost every other school of painting, sculpture and the graphic arts including prints and posters.
Gertrude Shibley
>>>>>>>The WPA was an idea that George Biddle presented to his close friend and classmate, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Biddle was a talented painter who felt the plight of the unfortunate and poor arts community during the Depression. He prevailed upon F.D.R. to create a program for this group of creative people.
>>>>>>>At the conclusion of the WPA. in the mid 1940's, thousands of artworks were in the WPA projects storage rooms and much of the work was lost or sold off by the pound. Despite the unfortunate way the WPA and the government dealt with the artists work at the conclusion of the project, many positive results took place. The artists for the most part were able to sustain themselves through difficult times. Many artists gained experience, their careers were helped and life-time friendships began during the WPA. The general public became exposed to the works of art through the exhibitions, the schools of art and the public institutions that displayed the murals, sculpture and other works. Approximately twenty-five years after the WPA ended, the United States Government established the National Endowment for the Arts.
Jackson Pollock "The
Moon Woman"http://www.art.com/asp/display_artist-asp/_/CRID--4/mark_rothko.htm?RFID=054402&FT=Y&TKID=2717983 http://www.fineartstrader.com/janet_cohen.htm
http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/pollock/]
COMIC STRIPS OF THE 1930'S
Buck
Rogers
[http://xroads.virginia.edu/~1930s/PRINT/comic/cartoon.html]