Post Office Mural – Charleston MO

Description

The post office contains a mural entitled “Harvest” by Joe Jones. It was created in 1939 with the support of the Treasury Section of Fine Arts.

The mural “Harvest by Joe Jones was done at the height of the artists fame and is a classic subject for Mr. Jones.  It shows the harvest of wheat in a very labor intensive manner showing the cutting of the wheat, gathering it, and stacking it on a wagon.  Wheat dominates the field, though the farmers provide a great deal of motion.  It is all done under a dark cloudy sky.

Joe Jones was largely self-taught and won an award in 1931 which enabled him to travel to the artists colony in Provincetown, MA.  He was highly political and after becoming communist, was shunned by many of his patrons.  He joined the Public Works of Art Project early in 1934.  He moved to New York to pursue his career and was awarded a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship to depict the dust bowl.  His most famous work in the Whitney is from that period.  His later work was minimal and nonrepresentational and was not as well received as his early work.   He was a teacher at the Ste. Genevieve artists colony.

Other murals by Joe Jones are located in Seneca, KS, Anthony, KS, Hutchinson, KS, and Magnolia, AR.