New York City New Deal Art Tour

Why It Matters

New Deal art proves that government investment in culture can create enduring public assets that enrich civic life and reinforce community identity.

Key Takeaways

• WPA employed artists, paying living wages during the Great Depression.
• African-American muralists created Harlem Hospital’s “Pursuit of Happiness” series.
• Edward Lanning’s murals at NY Public Library democratize knowledge.
• Richmond Barthé’s 80‑ft sculpture at Kingsborough Houses showcases Harlem Renaissance.
• New Deal art remains visible, enriching public spaces today.

Summary

The video takes viewers on a walking tour of New York City’s surviving New Deal artworks, highlighting how the 1930s Works Progress Administration turned artists into essential workers and left a lasting visual legacy in public institutions.

The narrator explains that the WPA paid living wages to artists such as Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko and Alice Neel, and commissioned large‑scale projects like the eight‑panel “Pursuit of Happiness” mural by Aaron Douglas Hayes at Harlem Hospital, which chronicles the African diaspora and the Great Migration.

Other highlights include Edward Lanning’s expansive mural cycle at the New York Public Library, embodying the New Deal’s goal of democratizing knowledge, and Richmond Barthé’s 80‑foot sculptural frieze at Brooklyn’s Kingsborough Houses, originally designed for an amphitheater and reflecting Harlem Renaissance dynamism. The guide closes with a call to read his Art in America piece and the rallying line, “long live art by the people, for the people.”

These works demonstrate how federal patronage can embed culture in everyday spaces, offering contemporary audiences a tangible reminder of government‑sponsored creativity and its role in social cohesion and urban identity.

Original Description

Join Art in America and John P. Murphy, Curator of the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center at Vassar College, for a tour of New York City’s most notable New Deal-era art.⁠

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We visited Harlem Hospital for a look at Vertis Hayes’s 8-paneled mural “Pursuit of Happiness,” the New York Public Library at 5th Avenue and 42nd street to see Edward Laning’s monumental works on the evolution of human knowledge, and the Kingsborough houses in Brooklyn to see Richmond Barthé’s 80-foot long frieze “Exodus & Dance.”⁠

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Read Murphy on how the New Deal supported artists, and follow Art in America for more: https://www.artnews.com/art-in-america/features/new-deal-democracy-philip-guston-works-progress-administration-steward-davis-jacob-lawrence-1234780013/