After my trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, this piece of art stood out to me the most. “The Cathedrals of Wall Street” (1939), as you can see written along the floor of the oil painting, is a painting by Florine Stettheimer (1871-1944). Stettheimer was an American poet from New York. This painting has Wall Street viewed as an integral part of an everyday New Yorker’s life. According to the description of the painting, “Wall Street” was composed of financial leaders like Bernard Baruch, John D Rockefeller, and J P Morgan. From looking at the picture, I see that President Franklin D Roosevelt is right in the center being remembered and this could show how closely connected the politicians at the time were connected to the big businesses, especially the New York Stock Exchange.

I believe that this work represents Modernism because it isn’t really what a cathedral looks like. This painting is a trying to show how patriotic the New York Stock Exchange tries to be. It is trying to make the image of not praying to a God normal and basically giving in to the “Cathedral of Wall Street” whatever that is. It also shows the Salvation Army which could represent the charitable and helpful people who give their time up for a good cause. In the back shows big letters saying bank, trust, I think I might see it say the word Mortgage back on the right side along one of the pillars, all of the American flags, the American Indian, and Florine Stettheimer herself is pictured paying homage to the George Washington statue by holding a ribbon that reads “to George Washington from Florine” on the right side of the painting. All this isn’t really in the cathedral it is in Stettheimer’s imagination and I believe she is trying to show who the very few rich people are worshipping.

When looking for a painting that struck out to me it was hard at first because everything was just weird and made no sense, but when I came across this there were 5 similar paintings and they were all very detailed and beautiful. Reading the name Baruch in the description really drew my attention and hearing that the name of my school being represented is always nice. One question I had was why are the soldiers faces red and some have blue suits while others have red ones. I was also curious on what the flags which weren’t American flags like the blue one in the back.

-Nahian Emon