Olinka Hrdy and WPA/Federal Art Project, Los Angeles
Turner Falls II
c. 1935-1937
Scroll
Physical Qualities
Crayon and brush and tusche lithograph, Sheet: 407 x 288 mm. (16 x 11 5/16 in.)
Image: 278 x 214 mm. (10 15/16 x 8 7/16 in.)
Credit Line
The United States General Services Administration, formerly Federal Works Agency, Works Progress Administration, on extended loan to the Baltimore Museum of Art.
Object Number
L.1943.9.722
WPA workshops brought together artists at varying stages of their careers, allowing young artists to make connections with established peers. Concentric rings of undulating lines form a tunnel in Olinka Hrdy’s Turner Falls II. Perhaps Dorothy Jeakins, whose desk adjoined Hrdy’s in the WPA Los Angeles Graphic Arts Workshop, chose to echo Hrdy’s sinuous composition with the pronounced profile and sweeping tresses of her portrait of Teru Osato (c. 1920–1946), a Japanese American art student. Both Hrdy and Jeakins worked in the studio at the same time as Helen Lundeberg, known for teaching the post-surrealist style. Her print Planets features mysterious juxtapositions of starkly rendered geometric forms.
(V.Anderson and R.Joyce, Art/Work: Women Printmakers of the WPA, November 5, 2023)
Virginia Anderson and Robin Owen Joyce, The Baltimore Museum of Art, "Art/Work: Women Printmakers of the WPA," November 5, 2023 - June 30, 2024.
Inscribed: RECTO: LL margin (pencil): 'TURNER FALLS II.'; LR margin (pencil): 'OLINKA HRDY'. VERSO: TL (pencil): '#1696 - gr. 2'; UL (stamped in black ink, filled in with black ink): 'FEDERAL ART PROJECT NO. 3266 / TITLE 'Turner Falls No. 2' / ARTIST Olinka Hrdy / RECEIVED 4-21-37 / 9x12' and (stamped in blue ink): 'OCT 6 19[37?]'; C: BMA stamp.
