Agriculture and Industries of Ventura: Gordon Kenneth Grant (1908–1940) was commissioned to create murals for the post office in Ventura, California, in 1938.
This is a list of United States post office murals, produced in the United States from 1934 to 1943 through commissions from the Procurement Division of the United States Department of the Treasury. The principal objective of the United States post office murals was to secure artwork that met high artistic standards[1] for public buildings, where it was accessible to all people.[2] The murals were intended to boost the morale of the American people suffering from the effects of the Depression by depicting uplifting subjects the people knew and loved.[3] Murals produced through the Treasury Department's Section of Painting and Sculpture (1934–1943) were funded as a part of the cost of the construction of new post offices, with 1% of the cost set aside for artistic enhancements.[4] Murals were commissioned through competitions open to all artists in the United States.[5] Almost 850 artists were commissioned to paint 1,371 murals, most of which were installed in post offices;[4] 162 of the artists were women and three were African American.[4] The Treasury Relief Art Project (1935–1938), which provided artistic decoration for existing Federal buildings, produced a smaller number of post office murals.[1] TRAP was established with funds from the Works Progress Administration. The Section supervised the creative output of TRAP, and selected a master artist for each project. Assistants were then chosen by the artist from the rolls of the WPA Federal Art Project.[6]:62–63
Artists were asked to paint in an "American scene" style, depicting ordinary citizens in a realistic manner. Abstract and modern art styles were discouraged. Artists were also encouraged to produce works that would be appropriate to the communities where they were to be located and to avoid controversial subjects.[5] Projects were closely scrutinized by the Section for style and content, and artists were paid only after each stage in the creative process was approved.[6]
The Section and the Treasury Relief Art Project were overseen by Edward Bruce, who had directed the Public Works of Art Project (1933–1934). They were commission-driven public work programs that employed artists to beautify American government buildings, strictly on the basis of quality.[2][6]:58–59 This contrasts with the work-relief mission of the Federal Art Project (1935–1943) of the Works Progress Administration, the largest of the New Deal art projects. So great was its scope and cultural impact that the term "WPA" is often mistakenly used to describe all New Deal art, including the U.S. post office murals.[2][6]:63–64 "New Deal artwork" is a more accurate term to describe the works of art created under the federal art programs of that period.[7]
The murals are the subject of efforts by the United States Postal Service to preserve and protect them. This is particularly important and problematical as some of them have disappeared or deteriorated. Some are ensconced in buildings that are worth far less than the artwork.[8]
In 1971, the U.S. Postal Service vacated the building which currently serves as the headquarters of the Environmental Protection Agency. In 2013 the building was renamed the William Jefferson Clinton Federal Building.
Removed from the Post Office in the 1980s due to a complaint from the NAACP. In 1995 it was discovered in a closet, restored and placed on permanent loan by the Federal Government to Georgia Southern University[54]
Five-panel mural addressing Federal governments public works and arts programs as efforts to help the community in times of economic emergency. It was painted for $2,000.[58] Artist was an Oglala-Lakota American Indian.
A number of Kansas post offices were listed on the National Register on basis of their murals, as part of a study of "Kansas Post Offices with Artwork, 1936-1942".[72]
Tempura on pressed wood board "that depicts the friendly relations between the Osage Indians of southeastern Kansas and the early white settlers. On the right side of the canvas Osage Chief Little Bear waves to Dr. T. Blakeslee, a physician responsible for much of the peacefulness between the two cultures."[75]
oil on canvas Depicts a typical historical lumber camp populated by lumberjacks, sawing through timber; stacks of logs, logging equipment, workhorses, locomotive; Native American's observing the process[90]
oil on canvas. Completed under the Treasury Bureau's Section of Fine Arts program at the cost of $750. In Old Post Office included in the NRHP-listed Downtown Booneville Historic District.[95]
since 2004, mural has been on display at the National Archives Central Plains Region building in Kansas City, MO. It had hung in various city offices from 1967 to 2004
Indians Watching Stagecoach in the Distance
since 2004, mural has been on display at the National Archives Central Plains Region building in Kansas City, MO. It had hung in various city offices from 1967 to 2004
oil on canvas Map-style ceiling murals at James T. Foley United States Courthouse depicting the United States, the continents, and Earth's geographical poles
[35][134][145] A number of Oklahoma post offices were listed on the National Register as part of the " Oklahoma Post Offices with Section Art Multiple Property Submission", including those in Coalgate, Hollis, Madill, Nowata, and Watonga.
Oil on canvas Controversial in its depiction of Native Americans when it was completed, this is the best-known of Oklahoma post office murals. Shows Cheyenne chief Henry Roman Nose with his family at confrontation with white settlers.[148]
oil on canvas "This mural depicts a view of Freeland from Butler Terrace. Familiar buildings of the town may be seen at the left. In the central section are the mine and large breaker. In the right foreground is the Drifton State Bank, a landmark of the vicinity." — John Folinsbee[153]
The Treasury Section of Painting and Sculpture was a New Deal art project established on October 16, 1934, and administered by the Procurement Division of the United States Department of the Treasury.
The main U.S. Post Office in New Rochelle is located at 255 North Avenue, at the intersection of North Avenue and Huguenot St., in the city of New Rochelle in Westchester County, New York. The facility currently serves the 10801, 10803 and 10805 ZIP Codes, covering portions of New Rochelle and neighboring Pelham and Pelham Manor.
Westhampton Beach Post Office, the U.S. post office in Westhampton Beach, New York, is located at 170 Main Street between Mill Road and Beach Road. It serves the ZIP code 11978, and is southeast of the Westhampton Post Office on Mill Road.
US Post Office-Canajoharie is a historic post office building located at Canajoharie in Montgomery County, New York, United States. It was built in 1937, and is one of a number of post offices in New York State designed by the Office of the Supervising Architect of the Treasury Department under Louis A. Simon. It is a one-story, symmetrical brick building on a stone watertable in the Colonial Revival style. It features a gable roof with a square, flat topped cupola with Doric order pilasters and round-arched vent openings. The interior features a 1942 mural by Anatol Shulkin (1899-1961) titled Invention of the Paper Bag in Canajoharie.
The Bronx Central Annex of the United States Postal Service is a historic post office building located at 558 Grand Concourse in Concourse, the Bronx, New York, United States. The four-story structure was built from 1935 to 1937. The building was sold in 2014 and is being transformed into retail, postal service, office and restaurant space.
The United States Post Office and Courthouse in Eureka, California is a courthouse of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. Completed in 1910, this historic building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983. Its architecture, designed by James Knox Taylor, is mixed, reflecting several styles. It initially served as a customhouse, in addition to being a courthouse and post office.
United States post office murals are notable examples of New Deal art produced during the years 1934–1943.
Lucile Esma Lundquist Blanch was an American artist, art educator, and Guggenheim Fellow. She was noted for the murals she created for the U.S. Treasury Department's Section of Fine Arts during the Great Depression.
The U.S. Post Office, also known as the Berkeley Main Post Office, is a local branch of the United States Postal Service. The building, located at 2000 Allston Way, Berkeley, California, was built in 1914–15. The building has been described as a "free adaptation of Brunelleschi's Foundling Hospital." Designed in the Second Renaissance Revival style, the front of the building features terra cotta arches supported by plain tuscan columns.
Miriam McKinnie also known as Miriam McKinnie Hofmeier, was an American artist.
The United States Post Office Coalgate is a post office in Coalgate, Oklahoma. It contains a mural, Women Making Pishafa, painted by artist Acee Blue Eagle. The post office is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Helen Katharine Forbes was a Californian artist and arts educator specializing in etching, murals and painting. She is best known for western landscapes, portrait paintings, and her murals with the Treasury Section of Fine Arts and Work Progress Administration (WPA). Forbes was skilled in painting in oil, watercolor, and egg tempera. She painted landscapes of Mexico, Mono Lake and the Sierras in the 1920s, desert scenes of Death Valley in the 1930s, and portraits and still-lifes.
The Treasury Relief Art Project (TRAP) was a New Deal arts program that commissioned visual artists to provide artistic decoration for existing Federal buildings during the Great Depression in the United States. A project of the United States Department of the Treasury, TRAP was administered by the Section of Painting and Sculpture and funded by the Works Progress Administration, which provided assistants employed through the Federal Art Project. The Treasury Relief Art Project also created murals and sculpture for Public Works Administration housing projects. TRAP was established July 21, 1935, and continued through June 30, 1938.
Verona Burkhard (1910–2004) was an American artist, known for her murals painted for the U.S. Treasury Department. She participated in four public projects including three United States post office murals and five murals completed for the Immigration and Naturalization Service. She has works in the permanent collections of the Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Western Colorado Center for the Arts. As of 2015, her murals completed for the post offices of Powell, Wyoming; Deer Lodge, Montana; and Kings Mountain, North Carolina are still hanging in the buildings which were the original post offices. In addition to her public artworks, Burkhard received the 1943 Alger Award from the National Association of Women Artists and was one of the first honorees of the "Colorado Women of Achievement" program in 1966.
Jessie Hull Mayer was an American painter and muralist who won four federal commissions to complete post office murals, as part of the Section of Painting and Sculpture′s projects, later called the Section of Fine Arts, of the Treasury Department. She continued to paint after the New Deal art projects ended, focusing on botanicals, landscapes and maritime themes.
Eldora Lorenzini (1910–1993) was an American painter, known for her New Deal mural in the Hebron, Nebraska Post Office. She also worked for the Index of American Design.
Edward Chávez (1917–1995) was an American artist. His work straddled realism, expressionism, and abstraction; often incorporating both elements of modernism and his heritage as a New Mexican hispanic and native artist. He was an artist with the Treasury Relief Art Project during the Great Depression of the 1930s. He also worked for the Section of Painting and Sculpture, painting a mural in the post office in Geneva, Nebraska, in 1941. His painting Colt can be found at MoMa. His work is also included in the collection at the Woodstock Artists Association and Museum.
The Metuchen Post Office is a historic United States Post Office located at 360 Main Street in the Borough of Metuchen in Middlesex County, New Jersey. Listed as United States Post Office, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places on April 2, 2008, for its significance in architecture, art, communications, and politics/government.
New Deal artwork is an umbrella term used to describe the creative output organized and funded by the Roosevelt administration's New Deal response to the Great Depression. This work produced between 1933 and 1942 ranges in content and form from Dorothea Lange's photographs for the Farm Security Administration to the Coit Tower murals to the library-etiquette posters from the Federal Art Project to the architecture of the Solomon Courthouse in Nashville, Tennessee. The New Deal sought to "democratize the arts" and is credited with creating a "great body of distinguished work and fostering a national aesthetic."
1 2 3 4 O'Connor, Francis V. (Autumn 1969). "The New Deal Art Projects in New York". The American Art Journal. 1 (2). Kennedy Galleries, Inc.: 58–79. doi:10.2307/1593876. JSTOR1593876.
↑ "Arthur Kerrick". Facebook. October 23, 2017. Retrieved October 3, 2020. Arthur Kerrick, a Minnesota artist and member of 1937 WPA Alaska Art Project, received a commission in 1942 from the Section of Fine Arts to create a mural for the courtroom in the Anchorage Historic Federal Building.
↑ Peter Berningham. The New Deal in the Southwest: Arizona and New Mexico. Tucson: University of Arizona Museum of Art, 1980.
↑ Capozzi, Lisa Ann. "Creative Man". Indians at the Post Office: Native Themes in New Deal-Era Murals. National Postal Museum. Retrieved November 1, 2022.
1 2 3 4 "Geographical Dictionary of Murals and Sculptures commissioned by Section of Fine Arts, Public Buildings Administration, Federal Works Agency" in American Art Annual. Washington, DC: American Federation of Arts, 1941, pp. 623–658.
↑ Kathryn A. Flynn and Andrew L. Connors. Treasures on New Mexico Trails: Discover New Deal Art and Architecture. Santa Fe, NM: Sunstone Press, 1995, pp. 101–102.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 American Art Annual, Geographical Dictionary Of Murals and Sculptures commissioned by Section of Fine Arts, Public Buildings Administration, Federal Works Agency. The American Federation of Arts, 1941 pp 623 – 658
↑ Lester, Patrick D., The Biographical Directory of Native American Painters, SIR Publications, Tulsa, Oklahoma, 9780806199369, page 48, First edition, 1995
↑ Park, Marlene and Gerald E. Markowitz, Democratic vistas: Post Offices and Public Art in the New Deal, Temple University Press, Philadelphia 1984 p 229
Marling, Karal A. Wall-to-wall America: A Cultural History of Post-Office Murals in the Great Depression. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1982.
Mecklenburg, Virginia M. The Public As Patron: A History of the Treasury Department Mural Program. College Park: University of Maryland, Dept. of Art, 1979.
Puschendorf, L. R. Nebraska's Post Office Murals: Born of the Depression, Fostered by the New Deal. Lincoln, NE: Nebraska State Historical Society, 2012.
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