Actually we learn in this book that Grant Wood had several lives. His first 10 years he lived in fear of his intimidating father over a societal issue which arose after the Civil War of masculinity. His two brothers were thin, dark and scraggly like his father but Grant was blond, chubby and interested in drawing and in books of fantasy. Unmanly said society.
His mother was sympathetic and after his father went to work in the family farm fields for the day's chores, Grant went into his art studio--under the kitchen table, shielded by the checkerboard tablecloth.
The next life began when his father died when Grant was 10 and the fear of authority left. He still had feelings of frustration at not being able to meet manly expectations. He was first sent to a military academy and then to Minneapolis to study art. He went to Paris several times, beginning in 1909 and the first half of his career was spent in the French Impressionist mode of loose, thick painted landscapes. He met a patron who owned a funeral home in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, close to his Anamosa childhood home, and his patron provided a home for Wood, his mother and his sister to live in. Wood lived with his mother, sharing sleeping quarters for the next 30 years until she died at age 77. He was 44 .
In the field of Art, the School of Paris artists were making modern paintings with various -isms as philosophy. Grant Wood rejected this and began painting on panels tight controlled scenes of American Life. He had success in 1930 submitting two paintings to the Chicago Art Institute. American Gothic is still exhibited there and is an icon as famous as the Mona Lisa. This style of painting was called American Scenes by his New York art dealer and together with John Stuart Curry and Thomas Hart Benton, Grant Wood's work is called American Regionalism. During a very prolific period including Time magazine cover, graphic illustrations and portraits, Wood had artistic success.
conservative American population resulted in being his expelled from the Cedar Rapids house that his benefactor had been providing rent-free. Wood moved to nearby Iowa City, the university town 30 miles away where he had been teaching. The third phase of his life was the final 7 years when he had married, his mother died, and his painting output was minimal, with only 3 major paintings in this time.
One important idea from the life of Grant Wood is his decision to follow his own path. He rejected art from the Paris center of the art world and translated memories from a troubled childhood into memorable paintings in an American style. His paintings contain personal codes and puns and references to his lifestyle. He did start an artist colony which lasted 3 summers but the branding of his output as 'American Regionalism' was the result of art critics and his art dealer. He had artistic success but not without criticism, and his style of art was mostly ignored when another homegrown American flavor--Abstract Expressionism--took over top billing.
During his European art study he also saw north European Renaissance art using the newly discovered single-point perspective, and including a small scene at the vanishing point. Woods borrowed this idea to add a narative element to his work. I can't stress enough how important it is for our evolvement to borrow and build on various ideas artists have used before. Grant Wood is worthy of our study.
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