Jerome Meltzer Music
Road to Solon, Featuring paintings by Grant Wood, Music by Jerome Meltzer, Slideshow and Digital Art by Alman
Grant Wood was born on a farm near the small town of Anamosa, Iowa, on February 13, 1891. His family moved to Cedar Rapids in 1901 after his fathers death. In 1910 Wood entered the Minneapolis School of Design where he studied with Ernest A. Batchelder, an advocate of the arts and crafts movement and art nouveau design. In 1913 Wood moved to Chicago where he studied life drawing at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
In 1928, Wood went to Munich, Germany where he supervised the construction of a stained glass window commissioned by the Daughters of the Revolution for the Veterans Memorial Building in Cedar Rapids. While living in Munich, Germany Woods was attracted to the modern New Objectivity movement inspired by artists such as Jan van Eyck and Hans Memling. The New Objectivity movement revived a realist style of painting with stylized forms. This influence and his involvement in the burgeoning Regionalism movement of Cedar Rapids artistic community lead to Woods changing his painting style.
Woods is considered one of America’s foremost Regionalist painters. His work is a distinctive faux naive style. He depicted archetypal rural subjects that embodied the values of hard work, community, and austerity. Wood melded together Northern Renaissance art and Art Deco design bringing together these disparate styles into a uniquely American vision.
Source
