Name/Title
The New Post Office | Pauline Winchester Inman | Wood Engraving | 1949Description
Artist: Pauline Inman
Medium: Woodblock engraving
Circa: 1949
Old Accession Number: 1838
Description:
Signed bottom right. 1 of 2 copies.
Top:
Politics, 1956
Wood Engraving
Bottom:
The New Post Office, 1949
Wood Engraving
This petite composition evokes a strong sense of small-town happenings on the main street. The title Politics suggests its definition “competition between competing interest groups or individuals for power and leadership,” a common occurrence and topic of conversation in any community. Whether one calls it politics or gossip, it is a pastime that spans time, culture, and geography and stems from a place of care for one’s community. A small group of four silhouetted individuals convene in the dirt street in front of the Addison, Maine post office. The four men stand casually in a circle, listening, and exchanging views and news. Behind them is the false front architecture of the post office on Water Street in Addison, Maine (depicted in Inman’s 1949 print The New Post Office). The doorway of the wooden clapboard building frames a silhouette of another man, looking on from behind and, perhaps, listening in.