New Deal Art and Post Office Murals

During the Great Depression, federal programmes commissioned artists to produce murals, sculpture, prints and documentary work for public buildings. Post offices became particularly visible sites for paintings that represented local history, labour, agriculture and regional identity.

The commissions provided employment, but artists worked within official selection processes and often faced arguments over which communities and histories deserved representation. The resulting murals combined public education, cultural policy and the practical relief goals of the New Deal.

In The Trackers, Val Welch reaches a fictional Wyoming town in 1937 to paint a mural for its new post office.