Grant Wood

              

• Grant Wood was born on a farm near Anamosa, Iowa on February 13, 1891.
• Grant Wood lived in Cedar Rapids after the death of his father in 1901.
• People realized Grant's artistic ability at a young age.
• He studied design at the Minneapolis School of Design in 1910 through 1911.  He then took night courses at the Art Institute of Chicago and the University of Iowa where he became a professional designer.
• At 1915, Grant gave up designing and returned home to Cedar Rapids.  
• He served in the Army as a camouflage painter for a short period of time.
• Grant came back to Cedar Rapids and taught painting and drawing in the public schools.  He also, visited Europe four times during 1920 through 1928.  Grant Wood was exposed to various trends, but mostly focused on Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Styles.  He was drawn to paintings with glowing colors, smooth surfaces, carefully outlines, decorative repetition of shapes and patterns.  You can see all of these elements in his artwork.
• In 1932, Grant founded the Stone City Art Colony, an art school and artist's colony near Anamosa, Iowa.
• In 1934, Grant was appointed Director of the PWAP (Public Works of Art Projects) in Iowa.  A year later, Grant began teaching at the University of Iowa.  While working at the University Wood taught and lectured throughout the United States and became a spokesman for the concept of Regionalism in art.  He worked there until his death in 1942.
• Grant Wood is recognized as one of America's outstanding regional painters.  His American Gothic (owned by the Art Institute of Chicago), painted in Cedar Falls in 1931 is one of the most recognizable images of Western art.  Grant Wood helped to shape the American vision of the Midwestern landscape along with Thomas Hart Benton, and John Steuart Curry.