When art coaxed the soul of America back to life

With arts funding in the U.S. currently shaped largely by private donors and declining state and federal funding, Sheila D. Collins looks back to the New Deal’s federal arts projects. She writes that initiatives such as the Works Progress Administration Arts Project not only set the ground for the flowering of the graphic arts in the U.S., but also provided employment for thousands of authors, critics, musicians, photographers and artists who would become famous for their later works.