The Harpist

The painting depicts the former Union Station in Omaha, United States. Today it houses the Durham Museum. Its construction began on July 29, 1929.

Gilbert Stanley Underwood, one of the best architects of the Classical Art Deco style, was given a free hand in designing the building. The station opened on January 15, 1931 and quickly became one of the busiest stations in the country. The centerpiece is the Main Waiting Room painted here (now called the Suzanne and Walter Scott Great Hall). The hall measures 50 by 22 meters and is spanned by an 18 meter high ceiling. The hall has a carved plaster ceiling, with painted gold and silver leaf decorations, ten cathedral-like stained-glass windows, a terrazzo floor with a pattern, columns of blue Belgian marble and paneling of black Belgian marble. Six immense chandeliers, 4 meters long, 1.5 meters in diameter, and 6 meters from the ceiling, illuminate the Great Hall.

The building was demolished for a time, but those plans came to an end when in 1973 the Union Pacific Corporation donated the station to the city of Omaha. In 1975 it became the home of The Western Heritage Museum.

In 2016, the building was designated a National Historic Landmark by the National Park Service and the United States Department of the Interior.