"The Great Strike- Lawrence 1912" by Ralph Fasanella. Framed and personally signed by the artist (1996).Framed and Ready to Hang. Donated by Shannah Kurland in honor of Miguel Luna, founding member of Family AIDS Center for Treatment (FACTS).

Artist Info: Fasanella's painting focused on city life, men and women at work, union meetings, strikes, sit-ins and baseball games. He quickly developed a style which spoke to workers and the poor through the use of familiar details. Fasanella improvised a quasi-surrealist style, depicting interiors and exteriors or past and future simultaneously. He painted canvases as big as 10 feet across because he envisioned his paintings hanging in large union meeting halls.

Fasanella's opinionated, leftist-oriented artwork caused him to be blacklisted among art dealers and galleries during the McCarthy era. His wife supported him by teaching school. Fasanella's work, however, remained largely unknown for nearly 30 years. While he was acknowledged within labor and leftist circles, his art remained more of a popular curiosity.