Jun 022012
Telegraph Hill
Coit Tower
WPA Murals
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This mural is titled California and is by Maxine Albro. A wonderful depiction of the bounty of the California agricultural industry from Mt. Shasta Almond Orchards to Napa Valley grapes.
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The “gentlemen farmers” are actually the artists friends. Ralph Stackpole is in the checkered shirt and Albro’s husband, and fellow artist Parker Hall is by the tray of apricots. The NRA (National Recovery Act) eagle is found on the ends of the lugs of oranges. The NRA was the primary New Deal agency established by U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933. The goal was to eliminate “cut-throat competition” by bringing industry, labor and government together to create codes of “fair practices” and set prices.
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Maxine Albro was an Iowan who studied at the California School of Fine Arts. During the 1920s she studied in Paris and then in Mexico with Diego Rivera. Like Rivera, Albro was no stranger to controversy. A work of four nudes that she painted at the Ebell Women’s Club in Los Angeles, titled “Portly Roman Sybils,” offended some of the organization’s members. The club rescinded approval of her frescoes, and destroyed the wall on which it was painted in 1935. Also destroyed (due to remodeling) was her mosaic of animals over the entrance to Anderson Hall at the University of California Extension in San Francisco. In 1938, after getting married, Albro and Hall moved to Carmel, California. During the 1940s they traveled throughout Mexico. As a result, most of her work consisted of Mexican subject matter, which she was best known for. She died on July 19, 1966 in Los Angeles.
I really like the style of all of these murals!
What great detail in these murals
Wonderful post. Thank you, Principessa! Telegraph Hill and N. Beach were favorite haunts back in the day. Loved to frequent, The Shadows, bar and restaurant which had a knockout view of the Bay Bridge. Heard it is no more. Still love your city!
Isn’t it a pity when historic artwork is destroyed? The New Deal projects created much in their time, too.
I’ve been to Coit Tower, but it was many (many) years ago and do not remember there being these wonderful murals! They are a delight for the eyes! Thank you for sharing on Weekly Top Shot #33!
Too too bad those works were destroyed because of prudish ignorance. These are certainly bold and attractive murals.
fantastic mural…so sad that many of her works were destroyed.
I am enjoying this series very much. The detail of the California oranges is one of my favourites.
Your series on the Coit Tower murals is wonderful. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen these and have forgotten most of it. You got great photos in a tight space. I always learn lots from your posts. I didn’t know Albro was a muralist; I know her as a lithographer. Musing on the era, it seems we could still use an FDR-style NRA. Couldn’t bite my tongue; just had to say it.
I am really enjoying this series too! These murals are beautiful — I will have to come see them in person. Yes, why can’t we have a program like NRA/WPA now?
Wonderful photos… I just watched a show on this (Huell Howser/CA Gold) earlier today!!