The Corn Parade.

During the Great Depression, New Deal programs provided work for a range of unemployed Americans, including creative artists. Visual artists working for the Federal Art Project created murals for the walls of federal and state buildings and established community art centers in remote areas. The murals often depicted ordinary Americans, at work or in struggle, rendered in heroic, larger than life style. Few of the post office murals commissioned by the Treasury Department Section of Fine Art displayed the humor of Orr C. Fisher’s paean to corn. But the Iowa-born Fisher’s work suggests the kind of regional boosterism and pride of place that characterized many murals painted by local artists.

Source: Orr C. Fischer, The Corn Parade, 1941, oil on canvas—National Archives.