2-945-110 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Ballet Fedre, Chicago, 1938. 'Ballet FedrÚ - Grace and Kurt Graff - Berta Ochsner - Katherine Dunham - Great Northern Theatre'. African-American dancer, choreographer and social activist Katherine Dunham directed her own dance company, and has been called the 'matriarch and queen mother of black dance'. The Federal Theatre Project, created by the U.S. Works Progress Administration in 1935, was designed to conserve and develop the skills of theater workers, re-employ them on public relief, and to bring theater to thousands in the United States who had never before seen live theatrical performances.