Artist at Work

Based in New Jersey and New York City, Good was a prolific painter of still lifes, landscapes, and figurative scenes. During the Great Depression, she produced murals and lithographs such as this one for the Works Progress Administration’s Federal Art Project, which was established in 1935 as part of the New Deal to provide employment for artists. The tautly composed setting for this rare self-portrait evokes Good’s small Greenwich Village apartment-studio, in which she paints while listening to music on the record player. Although the subject of her work—the still-life arrangement in the lower right corner—is revealed, the canvas on which Good paints is concealed from the viewer, maintaining the privacy of her creative process.