Ben Messick Entitled Heavy Load (Los Angeles), this 1930s lithograph on paper scene is by Ben Messick (1891-1981). Messick was a painter and printmaker closely associated with the WPA and its Federal Art Project. As part of these New Deal initiatives under President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Messick contributed to a generation of artists dedicated to portraying scenes of regional American life. Several of his works (including drawings, paintings and lithographs) are in the permanent collection of LACMA and many other art museums and institutions. Working primarily in Southern California, he developed a dynamic and lively style, capturing everyday scenes of the Los Angeles area while also producing works from memory based on his upbringing in the Ozarks of Missouri. A veteran of World War I in France, Messick later studied—and went on to teach—at the Chouinard Art Institute. In the 1930s, he briefly worked as an animator for Walt Disney Productions. Messick’s work received significant institutional recognition, including solo exhibitions at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art (1945) and the M.H. de Young Museum (1947). He also exhibited at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and the Smithsonian. In 1951, a traveling exhibition of his work toured from Missouri to Long Beach, California. His contributions to the WPA were later documented in a 1965 oral history interview with the Archives of American Art, reflecting his role in the Easel Program (1935–1943). Ben Messick is the great uncle of Lost Art Salon co-founder, Rob Delamater. 1930s Lithograph on Paper 16.75"x22" framed Signed in the stone, lower right. Framed in a contemporary wood frame with a bone finish using archival matting behind conservation clear glass. Excellent vintage condition.
