July Fifteenth
Object NameLithograph
Artist / Maker
Grant Wood
(American, 1892 - 1942)
PrinterLithography by
George C. Miller
(American, 1894 - 1965)
Date1938
MediumLithograph on paper
Dimensions9 x 12 in.
ClassificationsPrints and Printing Plates
Credit LinePurchased by University Museums with funding provided by Craig Claussen. In the permanent collection, Brunnier Art Museum, University Museums, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa.
Object numberUM2023.206
Status
Not on viewCultureAmerican
Label TextFrom the University Museums Collections Handbook, vol. 2, 2025:
Grant Wood was born to a farm family near Anamosa, Iowa, and his memories of the land followed him as he grew into an artist. After the sudden death of his father, the family moved to Cedar Rapids where he graduated from Washington High School before beginning a serious artistic education in Minneapolis, Chicago, and the University of Iowa. Wood worked as a metal craftsman in Chicago, then returned to Cedar Rapids in 1916 working as a decorator and builder while adding to his modest income with his paintings. During World War I (1917–1918), he served in a camouflage design unit but was never sent to France. He later went to France in 1920, accompanied by his friend and fellow Cedar Rapids artist, Marvin Cone and made three more trips to Europe in the 1920s.
After American Gothic of 1930, Wood’s Iowa paintings commanded widespread attention. Although he had not worked in printmaking previously, when approached by Associated American Artists (AAA) of New York to provide drawings for an edition of affordable lithographic prints, he accepted. Wood designed a total of nineteen prints for AAA, including July Fifteenth. The image is the most recognizable of his lithographic work and very similar to his Regionalist paintings. The gentle rolling hills and carefully planted crop rows display Wood’s unique perspective on his home state of Iowa that he became renowned for. Eighteen of Wood’s AAA prints, as well as two still life paintings and two drawings, can be found in the University Museums’ permanent collection which also boasts the large-scale Library murals that Wood designed.
