The WPA & the Golden Age · Reading & the Stage
W.P.A. Federal Theatre Negro Unit in "Noah" a human comedy
WPA Federal Theatre Project, Negro Unit, 1938
What it is
A color silkscreen theatre poster billing the WPA Federal Theatre Project's Negro Unit in "Noah, a human comedy" at the Lafayette Theatre, Seventh Avenue and 131st Street. The designer is not named on the sheet; the Library of Congress dates it to the range 1936-1941, so no single year fits it.
Why it matters
The Lafayette was the Harlem home of the Project's Negro Unit, the New Deal company that put Black actors and stage crews on a federally funded payroll during the Depression. A poster like this was ordinary working paper for that experiment, tacked up to sell tickets to a specific run. It survives as a record of a moment when public money briefly underwrote Black theatre in America.
What to notice
Look at how Noah and his animals are built from flat cut shapes rather than drawn lines, each color a separate stencil pass laid down as a solid field.
Federal paper, a Harlem marquee, and an ark full of animals holding the whole thing together.
Provenance
- School
- WPA — Federal Art Project (United States)
- Format
- Theater poster
- Poster published
- WPA Federal Theatre Project, Negro Unit, 1938
- Source
- Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division · LCCN 98516610
Rights: CLEAR. Public domain — U.S. government program work (WPA Federal Art Project), any year. Gated by the poster’s own publication year. Cleared by registry on 2026-07-18.
Format
The full-resolution, color-managed file — restored honestly, yours to print and keep.
Sized to protect print quality — this scan supports sizes up to 18x24" cleanly.
Size
$29.00
