Federal Art Project

Employment and Activities poster for the WPA's Federal Art Project, 1936

The Federal Art Project (FAP) was the visual arts arm of the Great Depression-era New Deal Works Progress Administration Federal One program in the United States. It operated from August 29, 1935, until June 30, 1943. Reputed to have created more than 200,000 separate works, FAP artists created posters, murals and paintings. Some works still stand among the most-significant pieces of public art in the country.

The program made no distinction between representational and nonrepresentational art. Abstraction had not yet gained favor in the 1930s and 1940s and, thus, was virtually unsalable. As a result, the program supported such iconic artists as Jackson Pollock before their work could earn them income.

The FAP's primary goals were to employ out-of-work artists and to provide art for non-federal government buildings: schools, hospitals, libraries, etc. The work was divided into art production, art instruction and art research. The primary output of the art-research group was the Index of American Design, a mammoth and comprehensive study of American material culture.

The FAP was one of a short-lived series of Depression-era visual-arts programs, which included the Section of Painting and Sculpture and the Public Works of Art Project (both of which, unlike the WPA-operated FAP, were operated by the U.S. Department of the Treasury).

Notable artists

Some of the well-known artists supported by the project:

Berenice Abbott William Abbenseth Maxine Albro Lee Allen Charles Alston William Baziotes Romare Bearden Thomas Hart Benton Aaron Berkman Leon Bibel Samuel Bookatz Dorr Bothwell Flávio Cabral Eleanor Coen Francis Criss Rinaldo Cuneo John Steuart Curry - (His murals were funded by the Treasury Department's Section of Painting and Sculpture (later known as The Section of Fine Arts) and not the WPA) Stuart Davis Burgoyne Diller

Philip Evergood Claire Falkenstein Louis Ferstadt Lee Gatch Arshile Gorky Adolph Gottlieb Harry Gottlieb William Gropper Philip Guston Jules Halfant Marsden Hartley Donal Hord Jacob Kainen Morris Kantor Gwendolyn Knight Albert Kotin Lee Krasner Jacob Lawrence Tom Lea Norman Lewis

Abraham Lishinsky Michael Loew Conrad Marca-Relli John Marin Jan Matulka Dina Melicov Paul Meltsner Jo Mora Carl Morris Louise Berliawsky Nevelson Frank Nuderscher Elizabeth Olds Charles Pollock Jackson Pollock Ad Reinhardt Daniel Rhodes Diego Rivera Mark Rothko William B. Rowe Augusta Savage

Louis Schanker Georgette Seabrooke Ben Shahn Harry Shoulberg David Siqueiros John Sloan William Sommer Isaac Soyer Moses Soyer Raphael Soyer Dox Thrash Alton Tobey Mark Tobey Grant Wood William Zorach

"Wild Life: The National Parks Preserve All Life.", New York City Federal Art Project, WPA, 1940

• Willem de Kooning and Santiago Martínez Delgado were also employed by the FAP temporarily but were unable to stay because they were not U.S. citizens at the time.

Administrators

• Holger Cahill, National Director
• Audrey McMahon, Director of the New York Region (New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia)

See also

• List of Works Progress Administration artists
• Section of Painting and Sculpture
• Public Works of Art Project

References

External links

Poster for a Federal Art Project forum in New York City, New York, c. 1936-1941, at which Holger Cahill was one of the speakers.

• Exhibition: "1934: A New Deal for Artists". - Smithsonian American Art Museum.
• Photographs by Federal Art Project photographers from the collections of the Museum of the City of New York
• wpamurals.com: W.P.A. New Deal Art During the Great Depression - links to each state, with examples of WPA art in each
• "Art Within Reach" - Federal Art Project Community Art Centers
• Mark K. Christ & Sandra Taylor Smith, Arkansas Post Offices and the Treasury Department's Section Art Program, 1938-1942. Little Rock, Arkansas Historic Preservation Program.
• WPA-FAP Mural Division in NYC, and restoration of murals at the Williamsburg Houses and Hospital for Chronic Diseases on Welfare Island
• Iowa-born WPA Artist Robert Tabor
• Louis Schanker and the WPA in New York
• By the People, For the People: Posters from the WPA, 1936-1943
• A collection of 240 WPA Posters
• Federal Art Project Photographic Division collection at the Smithsonian Archives of American Art
• Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture - Federal Art Project
• Pine Tree in Michigan by Joseph Sparks for the Detroit Federal Art Project, Grand Valley State University Digital Collections