Refregier, Anton (American, born Russia, 1905-1979). SAN FRANCISCO '34 WATERFRONT STRIKE. Screenprint in colors, 1949. Edition of 75. Signed in ink and numbered 47/75, with the Title printed in the marginbelow theimage. 11 1/4 x 22 1/4 inches, 285 x 565 mm. (image), 18 1/8 x 28 1/8 inches, 461 x 715 mm. (sheet). Framed to 19 1/2 x 30 inches. In excellent condition.The work is a silksceen version of Refregiers mural entitled "The Waterfront - 1934" in the Rincon Post Office in San Francisco, Ca. The mural is one panel of a series Refregier painted under the auspices of the WPA during the 1940s. While they were still being painted the murals became controversial both for their Modernist style and for content, such as that in "The Waterfront - 1934" that portrayed episodes of California history that showed struggle and injustice rather than glory and achievement. The strike in 1934 had climaxed in a deadly shooting of two longshoremen by police at the foot of Rincon Hill, the very loction of the Post Office in which the murals were installed. In 1953, at the ehight of the Cold War, A Congressional hearing was held in which testimony was heard alleging that Refregier had Communist ties, that the art was not American, and more. The Califonria legislature voted to ask the U.S. Government to remove the murals but in the end nothing was done and they have survived. For and extended discussion of the murals and the controversy surrounding them see "Politics and Modernism: The Trial of the Rincon Murals," by Gray Brechin, a chapter within "On the Edge of America, California Modernist Art, 1900-1950," edited by Paul J .Karlstrom, UCal Press, 1996.
