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The Regionalists Movement in America
Page history last edited by Dr. T 1 yr ago
The Regionalist Movement in America
The regionalists were often referred to as American Scene Painters and they many times turned their attention to painting the rural life as America’s cultural backbone. The Regionalist Movement is also often times seen as a reaction to the “abstraction of the modernists” in Europe and New York during the 1930’s and on into the end of World War II (Kleiner 1068). The basic concept of the Regionalist movement was that it was a “people’s art” and anyone could be depicted doing any normal everyday activity. It was not an artistic movement that was concerned with honoring our leaders or the wealthy. The Regionalists took a look into the life of the individual that lived in the Midwest regions of the United States during the time of the depression and really opened the rest of the country’s eyes about how they lived each day. Generally, the artists of the regionalist movement would paint the scenes as to what was going on around them (Depression 2). This meant they always had plenty of subjects and different scenes to paint. The Regionalists are important to American Studies because they depict scenes that are frozen in time. These are pictures that give a look into the past and help the modern day student to understand the concepts of a past generation that once was prominent throughout American society. Not surprisingly, during the Great Depression of the 1930’s the Regionalist paintings had popular appeal because they often projected a reassuring image of America’s heartland. In many ways the public saw Regionalism as a means of coping with the national crisis of the depression through our cultural roots (1069). There are many Regionalists that are important to the movement. Grant Wood is perhaps the most famous regionalist he published an essay in 1935 entitled “Revolt against the City” and he also painted one of the most prominently known paintings within the Regionalist Movement which was entitled “American Gothic."
Wood along with the other two primary artists of the Regionalist movement which, were Thomas Hart Benton andJohn Steuart Curry were often referred to as the “Regionalist Triumvirate.” (American 2) These three men were seen as the beginnings of the Regionalist movement and they are the reason that the movement existed with much prominence among the American art world during the depression era. These men are also the reason that the Regionalist Movement in America exsisted. They wanted to make sure that they were depicting Americans as the truly were, for these men knew that their works were historically correct and would be forever frozen in time. As we will also see some of the men knew that their works would be used as propoganda for the United States government. Their paintings attribute much to American Studies and many of their works are still recognized and love by many Americans of this present day.
Grant wood
Biography
Grant Wood is often immortalized as a leader in American art and regionalism. He was born on a small farm outside Anamosa, Iowa in 1891 (Raine 1). His father was a farmer that was of Quaker ancestry, and his mother was a teacher. In 1901, he moved to Cedar Rapids, where grant did odd jobs to get financial support for his family after the death of his father. In 1910, he left to Iowa to learn in Minneapolis to study wood and metal techniques with Ernest Batchelder (1). That fall he began pursuing a teaching degree at the University of Iowa while also learning carpentry and also still painting. By 1916, he was a student at the art institute of Chicago, although he never finished his degree of study (1). In 1917 he returned from Chicago only to find out that he had been drafted into World War I. He was quickly released not soon after World War I and he taught for a year at the Rosedale country school, near Cedar Rapids. This would be the teaching experience that would earn his credentials as a teacher (2).
In 1920, Wood started traveling Europe with his high school friend named Marvin Cone. They made four journeys from America to Europe and it was on the fourth trip that Wood became moved by the German primitives movement in Munich, and he suddenly saw the possibilities of painting as the commonplace as something significant (2). Wood came back to America to work as an interior decorator for the Sinclair House and he transformed it into the Fine Arts Studio Group. This became a renting space for many of Iowa’s most talented musicians and also artists (3). In 1928, when he was vacationing with his family in the town of Eldon, Iowa, Grant not only found the model house that would be used for his iconic painting “American Gothic” but he also developed the idea for an artist colony in eastern Iowa, the first of its kind in the Midwest. The governing principal was to immerse artists in the Iowa landscape through a communal experience (3). In the slideshow below these landscapes can be viewed along with many of the artists other works.
There was high success to the artist colony that Wood had formed and this colony became known as the Stone City Colony Art School. Many of the Regionalists during the depression era were committed to attending this school, but there was a lack of funds due to the depression and the school shut down (3). Wood has also been appointed as a professor in the arts at the University of Iowa thus he no longer had the time to help with the Stone Colony School. Wood created works from 1929-1940. These are depicted in the slideshow above. These works are about the common folk, and these were some of the most popular works of art during the depression and the Regionalist era. In December of 1941 surgery in Iowa City revealed that he had accumulated Liver Cancer ( CRMA 3). Wood died on February 13, 1942. He had a fulfilling life with many great achievements.
The Works of Grant Wood
Many of the works that Grant Wood created are now permanently housed at the Art Institute of Chicago and the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art. He also has works that are housed at the Museum of Modern Art in New York (Stokstad 1100) . Wood’s works are iconic to American art and many of the works are easily recognized among Americans in this present day.
Some of his most famous works are" Woman With Plants", which was a study of his mother and this work was painted in 1929 just at the beginning of the depression (Stone City 4). In 1930 he painted perhaps his most famous work which was entitled"American Gothic" and this was perhaps one of his most controversial paintings. Another famous work of Wood was "Death on Ridge Road", which depicts a car wreck right before it was to happen. In 1932, Wood painted a self portrait which is very precise and his original photo plus the self portrait that he painted are depicted on the slideshow above. Also when viewing his works on the slides notice that each of his works are very realistic and about the common folk in America at the time of the depression. These are works of Art that allow American historians to truly understand the life of the Midwestern American during the harsh and historical times of the United States.
Helpful Links
Works Cited
American Scene Painting: American Regionalism and Social Realism. 16 March 2004. The Art History Archive. 20 Nov. 2007. <http://www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/americanscene>
Kleiner, Fred S. and Christian J. Mamiya. Gardner’s Art through the Ages. 11th ed.Orlando: Harcourt College Publishers, 2001.
Raine, Kristy. “The Stone City Art Colony and School from 1932-33” Dec. 2003. Mt. Mercy College Library Online. 20 Nov. 2007. <http://www.mtmercy.edu>
Sister Wendy’s American Collection Online. 29 Aug. 2006. PBS. 20 Nov 2007. <http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/sisterwendy/works/ame.html>
Stokstad, Marilyn. Art History. Revised ed. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1999.
The American Scene: Life of the People. 28 March 2002. Library of Congress Online. 20 Nov. 2007. <http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/goldstein.html>
The Regionalists Movement in America
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