George Washington High School
600 32nd Avenue
This mural, by Lucien Labaudt resides on the east wall of the library at George Washington High School it was completed in 1936 as part of the WPA.
In this mural you will find such notables as Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Junipero Serra, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Alva Edison, and Edgar Allan Poe.
Labaut’s intent was to give an expression of mankind’s knowledge through the printed word by showing portraits of literary men, scientists, statesmen, and religious teachers, all grouped, with symbolic attributes surrounding the central figure of Gutenberg, patron saint of printed books.
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Lucien Labaudt was a painter and a muralist. Born in Paris, France on May 14, 1880, he was educated in France but was essentially a self-taught artist. As a young painter, he was influenced by Cezanne and Seurat. After coming to the U.S. in 1906, he worked in Nashville, Tennesee as a costume designer while painting in his spare time.
Labaudt settled in San Francisco in 1910 into a studio at 526 Powell Street and is credited with introducing modern art to California. In 1919 he began teaching at the CSFA and later, with his wife Marcelle, founded his own school of costume design. A pioneer in modern art in America, he experimented with various idioms including Surrealism and Cubism. Labaudt died on December 12, 1943, in an airplane crash in Assam, India on his way to paint the war in Burma.
Labaudt is best known in San Francisco for his murals at the Beach Chalet.