Art+and+the+New+Deal

Diego Rivera and the South Wall of a Mural Depicting Detroit Industry (1932 - 1933) (JH)
One of the most influential figures in the development of public art in the United States. Diego was a Mexican painter born in Guanajuato, Mexico. Completed monumental works on both coasts and in the midwest. Famous for his use of the fresco technique. Had a tremendous impact on the development of mural art in the United States.

Aaron Douglas and The Aspects of Negro Life: Song of the Towers (1934) (JH)
An African American painter and illustrator associated with the Harlem Renassaince. Douglas was born in Topeka, Kansas, and received his college education in Lincoln, Nebraska. Douglas developed a new graphic style based on simplified, somewhat abstracted figures, often seen in profile. Douglas referred to this as eygptian form. Spent most of his midlife as a professor at Fisk University.

George Biddle and Tenement, Mural Study (1935) (JH)

 * Architecture - domestic - apartment
 * Figure group
 * Occupation - domestic
 * Recreation - sport and play - checkers
 * State of being - other - poverty
 * Study - mural study
 * New Deal - Treasury Section of Painting and Sculpture - Washington, D.C.
 * paint - tempera
 * fiberboard

Ben Shahn and The Riveter, Mural Study (1938) (JH)

 * Cityscape - New York - Bronx
 * Figure male
 * Occupation - industry - construction
 * Study - mural study
 * painting
 * paint - tempera
 * paperboard

George Stanley and The Muse of Music, Dance, Drama (1938 - 1940) (JH)
The monument was constructed from 1938 to 1940, as part of the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP). It was the largest of hundreds of WPA sculpture projects created in Southern California. It was described at the time as "an engineering feat...the entire hillside of this famous shrine made into a monument, in which are eleven hundred and eighty-eight tons of concrete, the forms of which are delineated by slabs of the same granite to the amount of two hundred and forty-five tons." (Art for the millions, ISBN 0-8212-0659-1) The granite blocks were originally lightly polished. They were quarried near Victorville, CA. The monument is composed of a multi-tiered concrete structure faced with granite blocks. A complex fountain system circulates water to pools at various levels of the monument. Granite sculptures depicting the three muses: Music, Dance, and Drama are mounted on the monument. The central figure of Music, 15' in height, is depicted in a kneeling position playing a harp. Dance and Drama, each 10' in height, are depicted as standing figures, located in niches along the sides of the monument. There is an entrance to the fountain pump and electrical system on the top tier, adjacent to the figure of Music.

__Sample Questions:__

 * 1) List three factors that determined how people experienced the Great Depression.
 * 2) The two nudes on the East wall of //A Mural Depicting Detroit Industry// are symbols of (Blank).
 * 3) Of the artists studied in //Art and the New Deal//, (Blank) painted the earliest of the federally supported public murals.
 * 4) Artists and writers of the 1930s often sought to (Blank).
 * 5) Shahn's interest in social justice is comparable to that of his contemporary (Blank).
 * 6) During the 1930s, artists faced censorship because of the (Blank).
 * 7) Biddle's //Tenement// was intended to illustrate the (Blank).
 * 8) Artists working for the government during the Great Depression were paid (Blank).
 * 9) The face in Shahn's //The Riveter// is mostly obscured because (Blank).
 * 10) The U.S. Government first established policies supporting the arts in the (Blank).
 * 11) Stanley's //Muse of Music, Dance, and Drama// is easily recognized as Art Deco in style because of its (Blank).
 * 12) Douglas's depictions in //Aspects of Negro Life: Song of the Towers// are both (Blank) and (Blank).
 * 13) (Blank) was the artist who most greatly influenced the role of American art in public places.
 * 14) (Blank) is the principle color mostly used, except for black to white, in Douglas's //Aspects of Negro Life: Song of the Towers.//
 * 15) From 1924 -1945, the Detroit Institute of Arts was directed by (Blank).
 * 16) Of American artists traveling to Europe, an increase in traveling art exhibitions, European Artists emigrating to America, international exhibitions beginning in New York City, and increased foreign influx due to war, only (Blank) did NOT contribute to American awareness of European modernism.
 * 17) Of chronological order, the beginning of the cycle, smaller panels than those on the south wall, depictions of the origins of life, and fewer panels than the north wall, only (Blank) is NOT true of the east wall of //Detroit Industry//.
 * 18) The //Muse of Music, Dance, Drama// best embodies the (Blank) style.
 * 19) The (Blank) provided electricity to homes in the rural South.
 * 20) //Tenement// was the (Blank) panel in the mural cycle.
 * 21) Of //Song of the Towers, From Slavery to Reconstruction, The Negro in and African Setting, Journey to the West,// and //Idyll of the Deep South,// only (Blank) is NOT a panel title in //Aspects of Negro Life//.
 * 22) George Biddle received formal artistic training at (Blank).
 * 23) The poem (Blank) was Ben Shahn's inspiration for //Resources of America//.
 * 24) Of gray, brown, red, green, and white, (Blank) is the only color NOT used in //The Riveter//.
 * 25) (Blank) designed the Academy Award statue.
 * 26) Ben Shahn joined the (Blank) (a New Deal agency) in 1935.
 * 27) Of poor healthcare, inadequate housing, racist Jim Crow laws, lack of farm industrialization, and limited educational opportunities, (Blank) was NOT a catalyst for African American migration in the early twentieth century.
 * 28) (Blank) and (Blank) were two artists who worked on publicly controversial murals.