While current art and design for social change is certainly more important as it is meant for a contemporary audience and contemporary change, it is also important to look at some of the history of art for social change and well being. The first thing that pops into my head when I think about the subject is the Works Progress Administration (later Work Projects Administraion, WPA). The WPA did many things for social betterment throughout the Great Depression but what I always remember is the artists they commissioned for public works.
Most iconic of these artists and their work from the period is Diego Rivera. Rivera, a Mexican artist, had moved to the United States around 1930 and was commissioned to make some murals in Detroit in 1932. Titled Detroit Industry, the series of murals depicts the Ford Motor Company and celebrates its workers, in effect giving the success of the company to the workers and helping them to acknowledge their own importance in a time of widespread unemployment and financial crisis.
Rivera is thought to have been the inspiration for the entire WPA program, which besides employing artists to create public works employed millions of unemployed laborers ,created roads and parks, and distributed food and clean clothing to unemployed workers and families.
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