Grant Wood: American Gothic and Other Fables

Grant Wood’s experience as a decorative artist led him to view fine and applied art as being equal. In addition to designing textiles, an armchair and accompanying ottoman, and a Steuben glass vase, he illustrated two books and made cover images for eight others. The first book he illustrated was the 1935 children’s book Farm on the Hill, written by Madeline Darrough Horn. In 1936, he illustrated a deluxe publication of Sinclair Lewis’s novel Main Street (1920). As he often did with his paintings, he asked friends to pose for the illustrations, dressing them in costume for the occasion. 

Wood’s desire to reach a broad audience with his art likewise led him to make lithographs through the Associated American Artists (AAA), which published and sold prints by major American artists in department stores and by direct mail for five dollars apiece. Making affordable art appealed to Wood, who completed eighteen lithographs for the AAA between 1937 and 1941.