Michigan Post Office Murals Project

Chelsea: The Mural

The main subject of George Fisher’s Chelsea mural, Way of Life, is not uncommon for the Section of Fine Arts—a white family comprised of a mother, father, and young child set amid an idyllic rural setting with references to the town’s wool and milling industries in the distance. Certainly, Michigan has its share of rural family murals, yet they tend to highlight either a pioneer past like Allan Thomas’s Extending the Frontier in Northwest Territory for Crystal Falls, or vaguely contemporary figures engaged in daily life like Arthur Getz’s Harvest in Bronson. Fisher’s human figures, while dressed in modern clothing, are reclining in a way reminiscent of Neoclassicism, giving the mural an anti-modern quality in comparison to work by younger muralists, who were influenced by the American Regionalists and the Mexican muralists. More specifically, the three figures at the center of the composition turn and contort their bodies while the mother’s hand delicately grasps the father’s arm, which is outstretched to gently support the son reaching toward a dangling apple. Their bodies have a sculptural quality that is expressed in their poses and in clothing that clings to their forms. It is no surprise that an earlier sketch of Fisher’s included nude figures. (See Process) Still, a close inspection of the figures reveals green and red tints in their skin and wavy lines in the mother’s dress that give the painting a subtle experimental quality.

Nevertheless, the mural’s style also conveys Fisher’s more classical training. (See Artist) The carefully balanced symmetry of the composition with the two apple trees paired with a mirrored spinning wheel and grindstone, along with the more muted color scheme, distinguish this mural from the more expected New Deal style of many of Michigan’s post office murals. In fact, we know from their correspondence with Fisher that the Section was concerned that the mural might be too “decorative” and “saccharine.” The figures reclining upon lumber and sheaves of wheat make them reminiscent of allegorical figures promoting a state’s industries, like the nineteenth-century muses that Tommaso Juglaris painted in the dome of Michigan’s capitol. But for all of the Section’s fears about the mural’s tone and style, Fisher’s painting proved to be a strong work that was well received by the community despite its incongruity with other Section art.