Culturally Curious Art Lecture Series: Creating Hope: The New Deal and WPA Art

Creating Hope: The New Deal and WPA Art

Discover one of the most ambitious cultural experiments in American history, when the federal government employed thousands of artists, photographers, and muralists to document and beautify a nation struggling through the Great Depression. The Works Progress Administration and Farm Security Administration programs transformed unemployed creative professionals into chroniclers of American resilience, producing iconic images like Dorothea Lange’s “Migrant Mother” that would define how we remember this pivotal era. How did government patronage shape artistic vision, and what happens when democracy itself becomes both patron and subject of American art? By examining works by Walker Evans, Gordon Parks, Thomas Hart Benton, and scores of lesser-known artists who fanned out across the country with cameras, brushes, and chisels, this program reveals how New Deal arts programs created a collective portrait of America that celebrated the dignity of ordinary people while laying the foundation for a uniquely democratic approach to supporting the arts.

About the presenter:
Jane Oneail is the founder of Culturally Curious, a company that curates and presents art appreciation programs. Jane holds a master’s in Art History from Boston University and a master’s in Education from Harvard University. Born and raised in NH, she has worked at some of the state’s most esteemed cultural institutions, including the League of New Hampshire Craftsmen, where she served as Executive Director, and the Currier Museum of Art, where she held the role of Senior Educator. Jane has also taught at the college level for more than a decade, most recently at Southern New Hampshire University.

For more information visit: iamculturallycurious.com

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