Existing comment:
Alice Dinneen -- Black Panther (1934):
A black panther surrounded by tropical foliage hardly seems part of "the American Scene" that Public Works of Art Project artists were asked to depict. Yet the artist's taste for the exotic was common in an era when American city dwellers longed for the momentary escape provided by movies, plays, radio shows, and even the zoo. New Yorkers like Alice Dinneen found all these resources close at hand. She explained to the PWAP, "I am making studies of animals from life at the Bronx Zoo, and tropical plants, which I will compose together." The New York Botanical Garden, conveniently located next to the zoo, provided plants for Dinneen to study. A palm and a banana plant stand in the background, while an elephant ear and a caladium sprout just behind the reclining cat. Prayer plants add bright red and green touches to the lower corners of the painting. Grouping these common, imported plants around the reclining panther, whose relatives roamed distant Africa and Asia, Dinneen created an appealing lush imaginary retreat. |