Category:Jersey Homesteads mural sinopia

Excerpt from the first panel of the interpretive graphics created for the permanent installation of Ben Shahn's sinopia for the Jersey Homesteads mural:

• Early in his career, Ben Shahn decided he would paint "stories." Shahn's Jersey Homesteads mural is the story of persecution, immigration and community building. It is the story of the Eastern European Jews who came to America seeking freedom and opportunity. Shahn wanted to give the mural a sense of the people, where they came from, what they were doing and what their purpose in life might be. The artist began the work in 1936 by creating this full-sized underdrawing known as a sinopia. The mural was completed in 1938, shortly before he and his family moved to Jersey Homesteads.