During the 1930s, Bernard Perlin was one of many artists employed by New Deal programs such as the Works Progress Administration to create public works of art, notably post-office murals, that made visible the history of the United States and the labor of those who built this nation. In the early 1940s, Perlin worked for the Office of War Information (OWI) under his mentor Ben Shahn, a leading artist in the American Social Realist movement.

During this time, Perlin produced powerful images, reproduced as posters and an iconic advertisement for war bonds, that decried the horrors of World War II and supported the U.S. war effort in the fight for liberty. Join Dr. Melanie Herzog to learn about Perlin’s and Shahn’s approach to art and propaganda during these years, and their use of the visual language of social realism in murals and their work for the OWI.