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Spotlight: Organ Screen by Sargent Claude Johnson
Organ Screen by Sargent Claude Johnson is a redwood sculpture created 1933–1934. It depicts children singing and playing instruments, and animals in a woodland setting. The WPA hired Johnson to create it to cover the organ pipes in the auditorium of the California School for the Blind.
Sargent Claude Johnson (1888–1967), Organ Screen, 1933–34. Gilded and painted redwood, 105 × 264 × 2 in. (266.7 × 670.6 × 5.1 cm). Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens, Purchased with funds from the Art Collectors’ Council, the Connie Perkins Endowment, and the Virginia Steele Scott Acquisition Fund for American Art in honor of George Abdo and Roy Ritchie, 2011.5, Commissioned by the Federal Arts Project for the Works Progress Administration (WPA). Photo © 2014 Fredrik Nilsen
Overview
Artwork Title: Organ Screen
Date of Creation: 1933–34
Creator: Sargent Claude Johnson (1888–1967), American
Synopsis: Organ Screen by Sargent Claude Johnson is a massive carved and painted redwood sculptural work that depicts children singing and playing instruments alongside animals in a woodland setting. The Works Progress Administration hired Johnson to create this work for the California School for the Blind. The screen covered the pipes of the organ in the auditorium, and the sound traveled through it.
Listen to curator Dennis Carr talk about the history and significance of the Organ Screen.
About the Artist
Artist Sargent Claude Johnson looks at a sculpture inside a studio. Everett Collection.
| Everett Collection/Bridgeman Images.
