Franklin Roosevelt’s Administration

The arts played a major role in America during the 1930’s and were strongly supported by Franklin Roosevelt and his administration.  During the Great Depression the arts lifted the spirits of the United States citizens.  The visual arts as well as the physical arts were both promoted by the Roosevelt administration to help make the Depression a little bit more bearable. 

The Roosevelt administration really promoted the arts to help keep peoples’ mind off of the economic problems.  The Roosevelt administration designed various programs in the New Deal that dealt with creating programs that would make the arts available to people of all financial situations.  One of the most successful programs created was the WPA (Works Progress Administration). The WPA employed many professionals who,

“wrote guides to cities, collected historical slave narratives, painted murals on the walls of schools and other public buildings, and preformed in theater troupes around the country” (2005, Gerald A. Danzer, The Americans Reconstruction to the 21st Century).

This helped give job opportunities to people who didn’t have them and at the same time decorated the landscape across America.  This is how the Roosevelt administration supported the arts during the Great Depression.

Visual artists such as painters and authors were significant in keeping citizens’ thoughts optimistic throughout the Great Depression.  Artists would paint pictures that would show people living in large houses with happy families.  These paintings captured the viewer’s attention because they portrayed their dreams.  These paintings gave people hope that in the future they could be successful and happy.  Authors wrote stories about the pictures that the artists painted.  The readers loved to read about the fairytale lives of the characters, but put themselves inside the novel.  These books and paintings were more then something to look at or read they were hope of a better life.

Leisure activities of Americans held a large part in occupying the citizens time during the Great Depression.  People joined theater troupes as not only a job, but also as a form of entertainment.  There were also a lot of movies being produced to provide jobs for people.  Movies also raised the spirits of the citizens by giving them a view of what it is to be happy.  These movies were all about rich and famous people and it made the citizens forget about the horrible situations they were going through and just relax for a short period of time.  That is how leisure activities made the Great Depression a little bit more bearable for the citizens during the Great Depression.

Therefore, during the Great Depression the arts were very influential to the American citizens.  The visual and physical arts provided a feeling of hope for the future of the economy.  The arts also provided an idealist dream for their families’ future.  The arts also had the full support of the Roosevelt administration.  Without the arts the Great Depression would not have improved as quickly as they did.