Collection Exhibitions
Enough to Live On: Art from the WPA
Completed1/27/2017 - 7/8/2017
Organizing institution: Krannert Art Museum at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Primary Curator: Kathryn Koca Polite
Under the Works Progress Administration, the Federal Art Project (1935–1943) was the largest of the New Deal art programs and focused on all areas of the visual arts—including design, the fine arts, and art education. In 1933, Franklin D. Roosevelt proposed the New Deal, a series of programs that sought recovery and reform from the Great Depression by creating jobs and aiding the unemployed with enough money to live on. Thousands of artists were commissioned by the government through the Federal Art Project to create public works that captured the state of the nation at that time, which resulted in prints disseminated throughout the country, hundreds of murals installed in various government buildings, and the creation of various community centers. This exhibition focuses on WPA works—prints, paintings, and sculptures—allocated from the federal government that are currently housed in the museum’s permanent collection.
- Albert Abramovitz (Riga, Russia, 1879 - 1963, East Meadow, New York, USA)
- Biagio Melaragno (active United States, ca. 1936 - )
- Boris Gilbertson (Evanston, IL, USA, 1907 - 1982, Santa Fe, NM, USA)
- Boris Gorelick (Russia, 1912 - 1984)
- Charles Turzak (Streator, IL, USA, 1899 - 1985, Orlando, FL, USA)
- Clement Bernard Haupers (St. Paul, MN, USA, 1900 - 1982, St. Paul, MN, USA)
- Edwin Boyd Johnson (Watertown, TN, USA, 1904 - 1968, Mexico City, Mexico)
- Elizabeth Tracy (Boston, MA, USA, 1911 - 1992)
- Emmanuel Viviano (Chicago, IL, USA, 1907 - 1980)
- Eve Garrison (Boston, MA, USA, 1903 - 2003)
- Florence Kent (New York, NY, USA, 1917 - 1989)
- Frederick Remahl (Hamburgsund, Sweden, 1901 - 1968, Claiborne, MD, USA)
- Fritz Eichenberg (Cologne, Germany, 1901 - 1990, Peace Dale, RI, USA)
- Harry Gottlieb (Bucharest, Romania, 1895 - 1992, New York, NY, USA)
- Hilaire Hiler (St. Paul, MN, USA, 1898 - 1966, Paris, France)
- Hugh Pearce Botts (New York, NY, USA, 1903 - 1964, Cranford, NJ, USA)
- Ida Abelman (New York, NY, USA, 1910 - 2002, Sag Harbor, NY, USA)
- Jack Levine (Boston, MA, USA, 1915 - 2010, New York, NY, USA)
- James Guy (United States, 1909 - 1983)
- Kyra Markham (Chicago, IL, USA, 1891 - 1967, Port-au-Prince, Haiti)
- Leroy Flint (Ashtabula, OH, USA, 1909 - 1991, Cuyahoga Falls, OH, USA)
- Louis Breslow (New York, NY, USA, 1908 - 2011, New York, NY, USA)
- Margrette Oatway Dornbusch (United States, 1905 - 1988)
- Nicola Victor Ziroli (Campobasso, Italy, 1908 - 1970)
- Norman MacLeish (Glencoe, IL, USA, 1890 - 1975, Naples, FL, USA)
- Patrocino Barela (Bisbee, AZ, USA, ca. 1900 - 1964, Taos, NM, USA)
- Paul Kelpe (Minden, Germany, 1902 - 1985, Austin, TX, USA)
- Ralf Christian Henricksen (Chicago, IL, USA, 1907 - 1975)
- Richard V. Correll (Springfield, MO, USA, 1904 - 1990, Alameda, CA, USA)
- Ruth Chaney (Kansas City, MO, USA, 1908 - 1973)
- Tom Rost (Richmond, IN, USA, 1909 - 2004, Cedarburg, WI, USA)
- Walter Edward Speck (Detroit, MI, USA, 1895 - 1979, Los Angeles, CA, USA)
- Walter Wellington Quirt (Iron River, MI, USA, 1902 - 1968, Minneapolis, MN, USA)
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