Social Realism

Trend in U.S. art, originating c. 1930, toward treating themes of social protest—poverty, political corruption, labour-management conflict—in a naturalistic manner. The movement was stimulated in part by the Ash Can school, the Great Depression, and the New Deal's arts patronage programs, including the WPA Federal Art Project. Works in this vein include Ben Shahn's Passion of Sacco and Vanzetti (1931–32) and William Gropper's The Senate (1935).

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