Grant Wood
1891
–1942
BirthplaceAnamosa, Iowa, United States of America
Death placeIowa City, Iowa, United States of America
BiographyGrant Wood was born in Iowa where he spent his first ten years on a farm. After his father's death in 1901, the family moved to Cedar Rapids, where Wood showed early artistic talent. He studied design, metalworking, and painting at the Minneapolis School of Design and Handicraft and at the University of Iowa while teaching elementary school. Between 1913 and early 1916, he attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Following World War I service as a camouflage designer, Wood returned to Iowa to teach.
During the 1920s Wood made four trips to Europe. He studied the work of late-nineteenth century French painters and was also drawn to the techniques of northern Renaissance painters. In 1924, he established his own studio in Cedar Rapids, and the following year he gave up teaching to do free-lance work as a designer and decorator while exhibiting his paintings locally and at such national venues as the Art Institute of Chicago. There, in 1930, he won a medal for his American Gothic, a depiction of a stereotypical Midwestern farm couple, which the museum purchased. In 1932 and 1933, Wood ran a seasonal art school known as the Stone City Colony and Art School, near Anamosa, Iowa. In 1934, he began teaching at the University of Iowa.
In the mid-1930s, Wood was at the peak of his fame. He created murals and book illustrations as well as paintings and, beginning in 1937, lithographic prints. Widely celebrated, he was popularly associated with Thomas Hart Benton and John Steuart Curry as the so-called regionalists—artists who championed American rural life in their representational images. Wood was elected in 1935 to the venerable National Academy of Design in New York. He traveled to New York and the West Coast as an active member of the contemporary art world, but he remained deeply identified with the old-fashioned rural and small-town Iowa he pictured. At the University of Iowa Wood drew controversy as a champion of traditional technique and practice at a time when the national art scene was split between conservative, representational artists and those experimenting with abstraction.
During the 1920s Wood made four trips to Europe. He studied the work of late-nineteenth century French painters and was also drawn to the techniques of northern Renaissance painters. In 1924, he established his own studio in Cedar Rapids, and the following year he gave up teaching to do free-lance work as a designer and decorator while exhibiting his paintings locally and at such national venues as the Art Institute of Chicago. There, in 1930, he won a medal for his American Gothic, a depiction of a stereotypical Midwestern farm couple, which the museum purchased. In 1932 and 1933, Wood ran a seasonal art school known as the Stone City Colony and Art School, near Anamosa, Iowa. In 1934, he began teaching at the University of Iowa.
In the mid-1930s, Wood was at the peak of his fame. He created murals and book illustrations as well as paintings and, beginning in 1937, lithographic prints. Widely celebrated, he was popularly associated with Thomas Hart Benton and John Steuart Curry as the so-called regionalists—artists who championed American rural life in their representational images. Wood was elected in 1935 to the venerable National Academy of Design in New York. He traveled to New York and the West Coast as an active member of the contemporary art world, but he remained deeply identified with the old-fashioned rural and small-town Iowa he pictured. At the University of Iowa Wood drew controversy as a champion of traditional technique and practice at a time when the national art scene was split between conservative, representational artists and those experimenting with abstraction.