Portraits on campus lacked diversity, so this artist painted the blue-collar workers who ‘really run things’

In the hallowed halls of Princeton University, Mario Moore noticed dozens of portraits of deans, donors, famous alumni and college presidents in buildings across campus, a testament to the Ivy League institution’s illustrious past.

Moore, a 32-year-old artist who had observed the same thing at other universities, decided he could improve upon the mostly white, mostly male paintings that today’s diverse student bodies rarely look at in the daily rush to get to class.