User:Buster7/Nellie G. Best

Nellie G. Best, also known as Nellie Geraldine Best, was an artist with the Federal Art Project and painted post office murals in White Bear Lake, Minnesota and Ontario, California.

Education
Nellie Best graduated with a BA in Architecture and Allied Arts from the University of Oregon in 1929 and served as a graduate assistant in her final year. She went on to earn a Master of Fine Arts degree in 1930. 

Exhibitions
She was a member of the Minnesota Art Association. She exhibited her works at the Cocoran Gallery of Art (CGA) in 1939, at the Guatemala Art Fair in 1941 and at Howard University in 1942. The Minnesota Institute of Art and the University of Minnesota also contain her works in their collections.

Murals
Murals were produced from 1934 to 1943 in the United States through the Section of Painting and Sculpture, later called the Section of Fine Arts, of the Treasury Department. The murals were intended to boost the morale of the American people from the effects of the Depression by depicting uplifting subjects. Best won honorable mention in a competition to paint the murals in the national Social Security Administration building in Washington, DC. She painted a tempera mural for the post office in White Bear Lake, Minnesota, titled Early Voyageurs at Portage, in 1940. The mural was part of the WPA's nationwide mural project to put young artists to work. The location of this mural is unknown. It may have been removed during a post office remodeling. In 1942, Best painted two oil on canvas murals for the post office in Ontario, California entitled "The Dream" which depicted George Chaffey, the founder of the city,  with surveyors and "The Reality" which showed a view of the completed city's Euclid Avenue. http://www.inlandlivingmagazine.com/issues/pdfs/ILM0809.pdf] *


 * Good clues for career here, but I don't think this source is a RS. Any chance you can find the reference? Edan Hughes, author of the book "Artists in California, 1786-1940"

Career
In 1940, she painted "Early Voyageurs at Portage", as part of the WPA's mural project for the post office in White Bear Lake, Minnesota. The mural is currently lost. In 1942, she painted two oil on canvas murals for the post office in Ontario, California entitled The Dream and The Reality.  The Dream depicted George Chaffey, the founder of the city with surveyors, whereas The Reality showed a view of the completed city's Euclid Avenue.

Obituary
Nellie died June 2 1990.