Activities of Justice

Henry Varnum Poor (b. 1887, Chapman, Kansas – d. 1970, New City, New York) completed twelve fresco panels for the Washington, D.C. headquarters of the Department of Justice. Surrounding the doorways of offices on the fifth floor, the series, which the Washington Post predicted “will take its place among the finest mural paintings of this country,” illustrates the various activities and functions of the department and its subsidiary branches. Around three of the doorways, Poor depicted scenes related to the Bureau of Lands and Customs, the Bureau of Prisons, and the beginnings of scientific crime detection by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Next to the door to the Attorney General’s office, Poor portrayed then Attorney General Homer S. Cummings arguing the Gold Case before the Supreme Court, and included Justices Louis Brandeis, Charles Evans Hughes, and James C. McReynolds seated on the bench.

For these murals, Poor used the “true fresco” technique, which requires the artist to paint directly on a wet plaster surface (usually a wall or ceiling), using pigments mixed with limewater. The paint forms a chemical bond with the plaster as it dries, resulting in a highly durable painted surface. A fresco must be painted in sections, with fresh (“fresco” in Italian) plaster applied to the wall each morning only over the area of the mural that the artist can finish painting before the plaster dries. The fresco painting technique dates back to antiquity, and was used continuously throughout the Medieval and Renaissance periods, particularly in Italy. The technique was revived in the United States in the 1930s, due mainly to the influence of Mexican muralist Diego Rivera, who is credited with reintroducing fresco painting into modern art.

Poor’s stepdaughter Anne, also an artist, assisted him in executing the Department of Justice murals, as well as a large mural titled Conservation of Wild Life at the Department of the Interior. Anne was responsible for the preparation of the plaster and its application on the walls. Describing his work, Poor once said that a mural “should be a human document with real meaning to the people who use the place.”