By New York Post (U.S.) | Created at 2026-06-07 19:54:15 | Updated at 2026-06-07 21:58:15
2 hours ago
A stunning New Deal-era mural of “Alice in Wonderland” characters that was dramatically rescued from a shuttered Manhattan hospital is now on public display for the first time.
The whimsical, sweeping panel series, dubbed “Alice of Wonderland Visiting New York,” was created between 1938 and 1940 by New York artist Abram Champanier as part of a federally funded WPA project for the children’s ward at Gouverneur Hospital, where many young patients were being treated for tuberculosis on the Lower East Side.
Then just before the aged hospital’s interior was gutted in 1981, the historic panels were saved and restored by conservators and volunteers — a monumental effort that was nothing short of a miracle, art experts said.
Now all 16 precious panels, including two recreated from destroyed sections, are on public display for the first time in an exhibit titled “Another Wonderland: Abram Campanier’s Alice Mural,” which opened June 6 at the Museum of the City of New York on the Upper East Side.
“It’s a very important piece to be shown because this mural is the only remaining federal art project mural that was created for a children’s hospital ward during the New Deal: It was very nearly lost,” exhibition curator Lily Tuttle told The Post.
The Big Apple-infused masterpiece depicts Alice and friends on adventures such as flying over the Brooklyn Bridge and Statue of Liberty, exploring Coney Island and the Central Park Zoo and riding a No. 4 train.
“For a kid living on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, this really would have felt like a fantasy land,” Tuttle said.
“It’s also a very modern vision of New York: The Empire State Building was still less than 10 years old, the fact that they’re flying in airplanes, the [ocean liner the SS] Normandie was quite a celebrity at the time,” she said, referring to some of the structures depicted in the murals.
The murals also represent a historic early example of art therapy, according to reps from NYC Health + Hospitals’ Arts in Medicine program — with their colorful, familiar depictions offering a much-needed respite to isolated children in an era before video games or television.
“When an artwork goes into hospitals, it’s really important that there’s some cultural relevancy, that there’s imagery that reflects your community,” said Larissa Trinder, assistant vice president of NYC Health + Hospitals’ Arts in Medicine.
“This [work] is especially interesting because you have Alice in Wonderland of Lewis Carroll’s story, which was incredibly prolific at that time for children … juxtaposed or placed in an environment where they could see their own backyard.”
The murals are among nearly 8,000 works in NYC Health + Hospitals’ collection alongside commissions from the likes of Keith Haring and Mickalene Thomas.
Conservators spent nearly four decades carefully restoring each of the paintings to their vibrant glory by using black-and-white photos as references, as well as meticulous study of some of the more preserved panels’ use of color and motion.
“They were very damaged,” said John Lippert, one of the paintings’ conservators, of some of the works. “There were areas of lettering that were missing that we had to figure out by looking through historic photos.”
For example, identifying a single missing word — “Marlin” — on a mural of the characters attempting to board a crowded No. 4 train took three months alone, he recalled.
“It’s detective work,” Lippert said.
The exhibit also offers an important glimpse into the earlier works of Champanier — a Jewish immigrant from Russian Poland who arrived at Ellis Island in 1905 and would go on to create other notable works for the WPA — the New Deal program that brought art to public buildings during the Great Depression.
After the exhibition’s closure in September, the mural series will be reinstalled at NYC Health + Hospitals/Gouverneur, which opened four blocks from the former site in 1972.
“They’re going to be on two different floors that kind of speak to one another, so you can see them all,” Trinder said of the panels, adding that the display will be exposed to the street through glass windows so that the public can relish the art as well.
“With ‘Another Wonderland,’ we hope visitors feel the same sense of discovery and delight that these murals once gave to young patients decades ago,” she said.
