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  The Wolfsonian–FIU is a museum that explores the inventive and provocative character of the modern world. Through objects and design, we reveal how the past influences the present and shapes the future.

New Deal Americana

August 1–November 18, 2008
The Wolfsonian–FIU @ 1001 Washington Avenue

President Franklin D. Roosevelt won the 1932 presidential election with his promise of a “new deal” for “the forgotten man.” Over the course of his presidency, he launched a series of programs to rebuild the United States economy, which had been devastated by the economic depression that followed the 1929 stock market crash. These New Deal interventions stirred up a storm of controversy in the country—conservatives painted the programs as “Socialistic” and un-American, while radical groups likened the administration’s efforts to the futile act of applying Band-Aids to a dying capitalist system. In duking it out over the New Deal, the government and its allies and critics employed a variety of materials, media, and visual strategies to relay their arguments.

Presented in conjunction with the major exhibition A Bittersweet Decade: The New Deal in America, 1933–43, the small installation New Deal Americana presented books, pamphlets, and ephemera that expose how Roosevelt’s New Deal programs were originally packaged, promoted, and criticized.