 Many writers complain that Dewey showed little interest in the avant-garde art of his time (for example, Eldridge 2010). It is true that Cubism, Dadaism and Surrealism play no role in his writing, and his theory seems to actually preclude Non-objective painting (Jacobson 1960), although he does speak positively of abstract art. Nor did he refer much to such innovative poets as T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound. Although this may indicate a conservative approach to the arts, he nonetheless had considerable influence on various innovative art movements both in his own time and later. Perhaps most significantly, the director of the Federal Art Project from 1935–1943, Holger Cahill, was a Dewey follower (Mavigliano 1984). Amongst painters, Thomas Hart Benton, the regionalist realist, was an early convert to his philosophy. Dewey was also on the board of the influential Black Mountain College, which had students such as Merce Cunningham and John Cage. Josef Albers, an important painting teacher there, was first influenced by Dewey’s educational theory and later by his aesthetics (Gosse 2012).