Family Restaurant, 1954
When Kyra Markham created this painting, she was living with her husband in a rustic farmhouse in Halifax, Vermont. We do not know the name of the “restaurant”—if it actually was one–in this scene, nor has anyone so far been able to name the people in the painting. In another one of Markham’s paintings, the people have been identified as locals, leading us to believe that these people, too, were people Markham knew in Halifax. Note the shelves in the background, built just for holding a great many pies. This may be a church vestry, a town hall, or some other public space.
Kyra Markham did Federal Arts Project work in the 1930s. She did commercial artwork (including anti-Nazi propaganda during World War II); she illustrated books; she painted; she was a printmaker; she designed sets; she was a movie art director; and she was a muralist.
She married a Broadway set designer in 1927, and the couple moved to Vermont around 1946. Markham became a member of the Southern Vermont Artists.