Fertility
Wood, Grant
1939
Artwork Information
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Title:
Fertility
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Artist:
Wood, Grant
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Artist Bio:
American, 1891–1942
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Date:
1939
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Medium:
Lithograph
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Dimensions:
9 x 11 7/8 inches
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Credit Line:
Wichita Art Museum, Museum purchase, Friends of the Wichita Art Museum
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Object Number:
1987.37
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Display:
Not Currently on Display
About the Artwork
Starkly bold forms and a carefully planned but uncomplicated composition combine to emphasize the sense of stability and permanence of American life which Grant Wood sought to introduce in all his work. In this lithograph, executed in 1939 and titled Fertility, Wood effectively suggests continuity with the past and hope in the future. His subject matter here is the American farm, aptly expressed by the Gothic style farmhouse, the barn and silo and the reassuringly fertile fields. This approach to the American ideal typifies American Regionalist painting of the Depression years which in reaction against big city sophistication, glorified instead the virtuous life close to the soil found on the farm and in the small American town.