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https://openvalley.org/files/original/d49baf1589879b9366362ddfdbbfad7e.jpg
189045f80d6b8b5bcdf1496bcd117078
https://openvalley.org/files/original/c35693978c9f42b23c9c46b3116cd38b.JPG
2d52e298fef1bdc8622d34f3f2f23aca
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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New Deal Gallery
Description
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This collection of more than 200 paintings owes its existence to two primary causes: allocations from the Federal Art Project to a New York state tuberculosis sanatorium located at Mt. Morris--the landscapes and still lifes were thought to be restful--and to the committed volunteers who helped preserve the paintings after the hospital closed. For several decades the canvases were stored in non-climate-controlled basements; it appears that doctors and staff removed at least three dozen works as "keepsakes." <br /><br />Despite the seeming tranquility of the paintings, they were created by artists primarily from New York City whose background was more political and aesthetically adventurous than this rural location would indicate. <a href="https://openvalley.org/exhibits/show/green-new-deal/about" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Follow this hyperlink to a short introduction to the New Deal Gallery collection</a>. We're grateful to the Genesee Valley Council on the Arts for access to their collection, which has been re-photographed and appears here at two resolutions: a cropped, web-friendly file size of around 1 MB; and a high-resolution file including the painting's frame.<br /><br />Items in this collection were created according to a consistent format: a short description of each painting in formal terms, followed by a biography of each artist. Where possible we have supplied hyperlinks relevant to their lives and to other examples of their art. In order to better view them using the Omeka program, click on the "View All" option at the bottom of this page to access various sorting options.
Date
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1935-1940
Contributor
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Cooper, Ken (project director)
Ritz, Abigail (photography and project assistant)
Additional research: Justin Anderson, Jessica Apthorpe, Jay Bang, Kristopher Bangsil, Julia Caldwell, Sydney Cannioto, Sabrina Chan, Paige Closser, Victoria Domon, Elana Evenden, Yadelin Fernandez, Michael Griffin, Madison Jackson, Niamh McCrohan, Ben Michalak, Ricky Noel, Elizabeth Ramsay, Skye Rose, Samantha Schmeer, John Serbalik, Marianna Sheedy, Emily Spina, Alison Stern, Ravenna VanOstrand, and Nicholas Vanamee.
Special thanks to: Deborah Bump, Mark Calicchia, Elizabeth Harris, Melissa Moody, Rebecca Lomuto, and Mai Sato.
Still Image
A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials.
Original Format
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Oil on canvas
Physical Dimensions
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23.5 X 29.5 in.
Condition: peeling, punctures
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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10 and Out
Description
An account of the resource
This painting depicts a boxing match, in which one of the boxers successfully knocks out his opponent. The victor, standing upright on the right side sporting turquoise shorts, looks confident and strong as he watches his opponent on the ground along with the referee. His opponent is curled up on the floor of the ring, his face downturned and covered by his arms. The colors are vibrant, and the work’s shadows create a realistic effect. Braverman's painting takes on new significance when considered in relation to economic conditions during the 1930s.<br /><br /><span style="text-decoration: underline;">About the Artist</span>: Born in New York City, Braverman’s subsequent life tracks alongside the changing fortunes of radical politics in America. He appears to have lived in Chicago, studying in Paris with<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andr%C3%A9_Lhote" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><span class="s1"> </span><span class="s2">André L’hote</span></a>, but he also was listed as Chairman of the People’s Institute in Toledo, OH during 1911. Perhaps his debut as an artist began in 1907, at age 19, with political cartoons published in <i>To-Morrow Magazine</i>: on subjects like<a href="https://books.google.com/books/content?id=xbQRAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA2-PA125&img=1&zoom=3&hl=en&sig=ACfU3U0dyxIxH28CdN4Y610NeODPEO1arg&ci=3%2C116%2C988%2C1597&edge=0" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><span class="s1"> </span><span class="s2">plutocracy</span></a> and class-based<a href="https://books.google.com/books/content?id=xbQRAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA1-PA227&img=1&zoom=3&hl=en&sig=ACfU3U2oi9aYqcwYxsP9E4ouX6zImpxyxQ&ci=125%2C680%2C770%2C960&edge=0" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><span class="s1"> </span><span class="s2">sexual politics</span></a>. During the 1910s “Barney” was Associate Editor and Circulation Manager for <i>The Progressive Woman</i> in Chicago. It was founded as <i>The Socialist Woman </i>in 1907 by Josephine Conger-Kaneko and in 1913 would become <i>The Coming Nation</i> before folding in 1914. He produced the magazine’s<a href="https://openvalley.org/items/show/920" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><span class="s1"> </span><span class="s2">masthead</span></a> much of its political art: on<a href="https://openvalley.org/items/show/918" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><span class="s1"> </span><span class="s2">child labor</span></a>,<a href="https://openvalley.org/items/show/919" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><span class="s1"> </span><span class="s2">domestic work</span></a>, and<a href="https://openvalley.org/items/show/922" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><span class="s1"> </span><span class="s2">women in trade unions</span></a>. Meanwhile, Braverman also was drawing political cartoons for<a href="http://dlib.nyu.edu/themasses/images/the_masses_index.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><span class="s1"> </span><span class="s2"><i>The Masses</i></span></a><i> </i>(1912) and publishing pamphlets like “Suffragists, Watch Out for the Wolf!” (1913). After passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, and as socialist unity fragmented under the duress of Palmer Raids and systematic anti-red legislation, Braverman became disillusioned and moved into poster art and advertising. By the 1920s he worked for the Curtis Company agency in Detroit, MI and then in 1926 the Hamman group in Oakland, CA. During his time in Detroit, Braverman played an important role in smuggling copies of James Joyce’s banned novel <i>Ulysses</i>. In 1922, the novelist Ernest Hemingway—who knew Braverman—suggested an arrangement with publisher Sylvia Beach: she would ship 300 books to Windsor, Ontario, where Braverman had rented a room; he would smuggle them across the US border individually, then re-bundle them and ship via a private express company. He asked only to be reimbursed for his expenses (no fee charged) at a time of heavy border patrols during Prohibition. Historian Kevin Birmingham writes that “it required him to break the law every time he crossed the border with a copy of <i>Ulysses</i>, possessed a copy for distribution in Michigan and shipped the book across state lines. He risked a five-thousand-dollar fine and five years in prison, but he would do it anyway” (<i>The Most Dangerous Book: The Battle for James Joyce’s Ulysses</i> 236-237). Later Braverman created works for the Federal Art Project, including “Down and Out” (1937)—perhaps modeled on the boxing paintings of George Bellows, like<a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bellows_George_Dempsey_and_Firpo_1924.jpg" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><span class="s1"> </span><span class="s2">“Dempsey and Firpo”</span></a> (1924). One critic reviewing a 1936 group show complained that Braverman’s “static figures against his dynamic backgrounds drop his picture to a poster level...he suffers from commercial art influence, with its false emphasis on showiness” (<i>Brooklyn Daily Eagle </i>9 Feb. 1936: 40). But Braverman’s work always had been grounded in the striking image, and postwar Pop Art soon would incorporate both political and commercial iconography. Braverman always had a great interest in films, during the 1940s working upon an authorized biography of the director D.W. Griffith that never was published. He lived the last years of his life in St. Paul, MN.
Creator
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Braverman, Barnet, b. 1888
Publisher
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Federal Art Project
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1937
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Ritz, Abigail (photography)
Sheedy, Marianna (biography)
Cooper, Ken (biography)
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
New Deal Gallery, Genesee Valley Council on the Arts
Object #FA18124
Format
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jpeg, 980 KB
jpeg, 12.1 MB
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Still image
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
034
Barnet Braverman
boxing
Federal Art Project
New Deal Gallery
painting