Grant Wood - 1891 - 1942 - is known for his stylized and subtly humorous scenes of rural people, Iowa cornfields, and mythic subjects from American history — such as the Art Institute’s iconic painting American Gothic (1930). Along with other Midwestern Regionalist painters like John Steuart Curry and Thomas Hart Benton, Wood advocated for a realistic style and recognizable subjects that showed local places and common people, a radically different approach from European modernism and its push toward abstraction. - Chicago Art Institute