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• 1 2023-07-21T13:18:34-07:00 Allen Hall Murals 11 plain 2023-08-18T11:33:12-07:00

  Within Allen Hall, there are murals depicting Louisiana in the middle of the 20th century. These murals were created by four artists: Roy Henderson, Anne Woolfolk, Jean Birkland, and Sue Brown. All students were under the direction of the famous Conrad Albrizio, who was famous for creating incredible murals throughout the United States, but most importantly, in the state of Louisiana. He created the frescoes at Union Passenger Station in New Orleans, murals in DeRidder’s post office, and in a courthouse in New Iberia, which the murals in the latter two was funded through President Franklin Roosevelt’s Works Progress Administration program.[1] 
   
  Albrizio was a muralist who embraced the need to embrace everyday people who needed to look at art the most. He adhered to regionalism, an art movement that aimed to be inclusive of everyone, not just America’s elite.[2] In 1936, when he first became a professor at LSU, he stated, “Art should not be regarded as a luxury or an appendage but in its proper light as an integral part of national and regional culture. Louisiana’s cultural and natural advantages, together with the inherent temperament of her people, should enable the state to play a leading role in the evolution of a distinct and interpretive type of southern art.”[3]
  
  In addition, Albrizio emphasized the need to buck the art trends of the time. In an undated newspaper article, “Art Prof Albrizio, Back From Europe, Discourages Faddist Approach to Subject” by LaRita Smith, he states, “If there is anyone in here like the many that are being guided by a fadistic or so-called popular approach to the “doing of art”... you may as well fold up...”[4]
  
  According to his former students, Albrizio also decided to emphasize the importance of  “social consciousness” in creating his paintings.[5]And it shows in many of his artwork. He decided to depict the life of African Americans in some of his artwork, according to De Mile Lonsberry in an undated article, “Oil Paintings by Conrad Albrizio Draw Praise at Exhibit on Campus.” This includes his famous work “Jordan”, a painting depicting the intensity and spirit of the people within an African American baptism.[6] And in one of his most famous works, the murals at the Union Passenger Terminal in New Orleans built in 1954, he created a mural, “The Modern Age” depicting the future of education, “wherein all races have equal opportunities.”[7]
  It is important to acknowledge Albrizio’s philosophy as we assess the value of his students’ murals in Allen Hall. As you walk through Allen Hall, the murals reflect the Louisiana of the time as well as Albrizio’s regionalism. It was a Louisiana advancing from the ruinous years after the Civil War to the innovative years of the 20^th century. Murals depicted Louisiana’s successful sugar industry, cotton industry, fishing industry, and forward-minded academia despite the downward decline of the nation due to the Great Depression. In fact, Anne Woolfolk’s mural is called “The Industries of the State”.[8]
   
  Roy Henderson created a mural representing the bright future and richness of Louisiana. His mural, called Louisiana Landscape, shows a family of three, a mother, a father, and their newborn baby sitting underneath a magnolia tree atop a hill overlooking oil derricks, a farm, and the beautiful countryside. You can see this mural right above the northeast entrance of Allen Hall.[9]
   
  Henderson also created the mural on the northwest corner of Allen Hall representing the arts on one side and the hard sciences on the other. His work contributed to the overall theme of Louisiana’s bright future with its rich natural resources and promising new generation of students. 
  
  Sue Brown also created the memorable mural of the northeast entrance to Allen Hall. Her mural shows a child huddling close to her mother and two other figures. According to an article by Douglas Gruse, “The Art of Social Consciousness” in LSU Magazine in 1990, Sue Brown (Dietrich) intended for the mural to be a “consideration of the function and value of education and endeavor in life.”[10]
   
  Jean Birkland created the murals right next to Anne Woolfolk’s and Roy Henderson’s. Birkland focused on the success of the Audubon Sugar School and the cultivation of sugar on campus by painting a mural of two students cultivating sugar. In addition, she created the mural of Conrad Albirzio painting a mural on the staircase leading to the 2nd floor, which faces the northeast entrance of Allen Hall.[11]
   
  However, in recent years, it has been clear that many people have been offended about the troubling depiction of African Americans in the murals created by Anne Woolfolk. While this concern is important to highlight, it is also necessary to give some historical context to ensure that the voice of the artists is rightfully included in the discourse surrounding the troubling past of our university and its association with the Allen Hall murals.
   
  Anne Woolfolk’s mural depicting African Americans only as manual laborers gives many people concerns over her intentions behind the mural. But Woolfolk does not seem to follow the prejudiced nature of society at that time. In fact, her vision for the mural was to induce a helpful reminder of Louisiana’s resilience and productivity through these tough times. She states, “The idea was conceived pictorially, from an optimistic point of view in an effort to express a temperate fruitful land where people enjoy living, and to stress the quiet, easy rhythmic tone of our “way of life” in Louisiana.”[12] On the southern side of her mural, Woolfolk even shows both people of color and Caucasians working side-by-side in the fishing industry.
   
  While it is too gracious to picture Woolfolk as progressive for including African Americans in her mural, it is also unfair to paint her as a bigot for including what we deem to be generalizations of people of color in her mural. Her work is simply a time machine to the Louisiana of the past with the state of Louisiana’s and LSU’s unsavory history with race and people of color. She finished this mural in question in 1941 for her graduate thesis. 
  
  For context, the first African American undergraduate student of LSU, A.P. Tureaud, Jr., was accepted as a student in 1954, only because a court ordered LSU to accept him. He only stayed at LSU for 55 days, with it ending when the lawsuit challenging segregation ended in a mistrial.[13]
   
  It is unfair to expect her to see beyond Louisiana’s backward outlook on race and the capabilities of people of color. Ultimately, the viewer is the ultimate judge of whether they find the murals to be appropriate for our day and age. However, one cannot do so without applying important historical context that brings to light the intentions of the creator.
   
  These four artists, under the direction of Professor Conrad Albrizio, have created insightful murals that reveal Louisiana’s society during the Great Depression and the cultural differences and similarities between them and us today.
   

   

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  [1] Bercier, Carolyn A. The Frescoes of Conrad Albrizio : Public Murals in the Midcentury South / Carolyn A. Bercier ; Introduction by Elise Grenier. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2019.

  [2] Desmond, Michael, Elise Grenier, Sue Turner, and Carolyn Bercier. The Murals of Allen Hall : Reclaiming a Legacy. pg. 14. Edited by Gaines Foster, Angela Harwood, and Jordana Pomeroy. Baton Rouge, LA: LSU School of Art, 2017.

  [3]  Desmond et al. The Murals of Allen Hall : Reclaiming a Legacy, pg. 14.

  [4] Smith, LaRita. “Art Prof Albrizio, Back From Europe, Discourages Faddist Approach to Subject,” n.d. Box 1, Folder 9. Conrad Albrizio papers, Special Collections.

  [5] Smith, LaRita. “Art Prof Albrizio, Back From Europe, Discourages Faddist Approach to Subject,” n.d. Box 1, Folder 9. Conrad Albrizio papers, Special Collections.

  [6] Lonsberry, De Mile. “Oil Paintings by Conrad Albrizio Draw Praise at Exhibit on Campus,” n.d. Box 1, Folder 9. Conrad Albrizio papers, Special Collections.

  [7] Albrizio, Conrad A. “Mural Paintings in the New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal,” 1955. Box 1, Folder 8. Conrad Albrizio papers, Special Collections.
   

  [8] Gruse, Douglas M. “The Art of Social Consciousness.” LSU Magazine, Baton Rouge, La., 1990. LSU Special Collections, University Archives.

  [9] Desmond, Michael, Elise Grenier, Sue Turner, and Carolyn Bercier. The Murals of Allen Hall : Reclaiming a Legacy. pg. 17. Edited by Gaines Foster, Angela Harwood, and Jordana Pomeroy. Baton Rouge, LA: LSU School of Art, 2017.

  [10] Gruse, Douglas M. “The Art of Social Consciousness.” LSU Magazine, Baton Rouge, La., 1990. pg. 42. LSU Special Collections, University Archives.

  [11] Gruse, Douglas M. “The Art of Social Consciousness.” LSU Magazine, Baton Rouge, La., 1990. pg. 43. LSU Special Collections, University Archives.

  [12] Woolfolk, Anne. “Execution of a Mural in Fresco.” 1941. pg. 6. LSU Special Collections, University Archives.

  [13] Rdaad, Youssef. “As LSU’s First Black Undergraduate, He Was Forced off Campus. Now He Helps Those Who Came after Him.” The Advocate, October 23, 2020. https://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/education/as-lsus-first-black-undergraduate-he-was-forced-off-campus-now-he-helps-those-who/article_39ad27fe-157d-11eb-9afd-1f72409a7442.html.