Art of an Era

A January sale at Swann Galleries showcases artists of the WPA

January 30, 2025

Swann Auction Galleries
104 E. 25th Street
t: (212) 254-4710
e: Email Gallery
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On January 30, Swann Galleries opens its 2025 season with an auction dedicated to the artists of the WPA. The multi-departmental sale will feature paintings, prints, photographs, posters, books and related material by artists whose careers were sustained by the Works Progress Administration between 1935 and 1943.

In the paintings category are oils by Doris Emrick Lee, including her Early Spring Landscape; Paul Raphael Meltsner and Philip Howard Evergood. Other works of note include August Mosca’s Portrait of Joseph Stella and Cecil Crosley Bell’s gouache New York Horse Auction.

Dorothea Lange (1895-1965), Migrant Mother, Nipomo, California, 1936 (printed ca. 1993). Silver print, 9½ x 7½ in. Estimate $4/6,000

Also expected to garner interest is Thomas Hart Benton’s lithograph Missouri Farmyard, Louis Schanker’s color woodcut Jai-Alai, a charcoal by Peggy Brook Bacon and Katherine Milhous’s lithograph poster Visit Pennsylvania/Pre-Revolutionary Costumes. An exciting offering in the photography genre is Dorothea Lange’s iconic Migrant Mother, Nipomo, California, a silver print from 1936, printed circa 1993. Of the aforementioned works, Lange’s image and Metsler’s painting R.F.D. 36 have the highest high estimate of $6,000.

Thomas Hart Benton (1889-1975), Missouri Farmyard, 1936. Lithograph, 10 x 16 in. Estimate $2/$3,000

“I see three crucial, pivotal moments in our nation’s history: the American Revolutionary War, the Civil War and the New Deal,” says Swann Galleries director of modern and post-war art Harold Porcher. “These stages established a government ruled by and for the people, a unified people under one flag, and a government that provides for the people in times of hardship. The latter and the New Deal programs were reciprocal. The government provided jobs and income for the people, and the people gave the nation post offices, bridges, dams, highways and courthouses that are the engineering envy of the world. The art, too, was crafted with great care and attention to detail. There was pride in the work of the New Deal’s buildings, bridges, murals and art, and it shows.”

Bidding is available online, absentee, by phone and live in-person. A catalogue will be available a month prior to the sale. —