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Of all the arts during the period of the Great Depression, perhaps the most prominent was painting, particularly mural painting. And yet there remains, even among otherwise well-informed individuals, a great deal of confusion about exactly which governmental agency of Roosevelt's New Deal was primarily responsible for this. It is commonplace today (and even during the depression) to refer to all art produced under the auspices of the New Deal as "WPA art," but this is only partially correct. The WPA, or Works Progress Administration (later retitled the Works Project Administration), was a large umbrella organization that funded a wide range of programs. In addition to its other areas, the WPA created several projects dealing directly with the arts: the Federal Writer's Project (FWP), which funded writers and focused on guide books to the then forty-- eight states; the little-known Federal Music Project (FMP); the Federal Theater Project (FTP), which was responsible for such highly controversial theatrical productions as "living newspapers" that commented on current events; and the Federal Art Project (FAR popularly known as "The Project," which funded unemployed artists.
The roots of the FAP go back to 1933 with the creation of a national art project based on the works of the Mexican School, sponsored by Mexican President Alvaro Obregon. Although the socialist and Marxist murals of artists such as Diego Rivera, Clemente Orozco, and David Siqueros expressed quite different political views from what George Biddle envisioned for America, he approached Franklin Roosevelt about the possibilities of promoting Roosevelt's "revolution" by means of such public art. "Noting the grand achievements of the Mexican Muralists, [Biddle] portrayed young American artists, supporters of a Roosevelt-- guided social revolution, as being eager to express the ideals of that revolution on the public walls of America" (1).
The result was the creation of the short-lived Public Works of Art Project (PWAP), which lasted only until June 1934. The PWAP, under the directorship of Edward Bruce, sought to promote images of the "American Scene" and did not confine artistic productions to murals, but promoted easel painting as well. The "American Scene" focus (which was encouraged by the PWAP, but not insisted upon) featured optimistic visions of America during a time of economic desperation, a vision that coalesced into...