Provenance
The artist; sold to Irwin [1880-1953] and Clara R. Sax [1889-1981] Strasburger, White Plains, New York, by 1944;[1] bequest 1982 to NGA.
[1] Darrell Garwood, _Artist in Iowa: A Life of Grant Wood_, New York, 1944: 222, 254.
Accession Number
1982.7.2
Medium
oil on canvas on paperboard mounted on hardboard
Dimensions
overall: 33 x 37.9 cm (13 x 14 15/16 in.) | framed: 53.3 x 58.4 x 3.2 cm (21 x 23 x 1 1/4 in.)
Classification
Painting
Credit Line
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Irwin Strasburger
Tags
Painting Early Modern (1901–1950) Oil Painting Canvas Board American Color: Orange Color: Yellow
Background & Context
Background Story
Grant Wood (1891-1942) was an American painter known for his Regionalist paintings of the American Midwest, particularly American Gothic (1930) which became one of the most recognized paintings in American art. New Road from 1939 depicts a newly constructed road cutting through the Iowa landscape in the precisely modeled, slightly stylized manner that distinguishes Wood's Regionalist painting. The 1939 date places this in Wood's mature period, when he was producing the precisely modeled landscapes of Iowa that established him as the leading Regionalist painter of the Midwest.
Cultural Impact
New Road is important in Wood's mature oeuvre because it demonstrates the precisely modeled, slightly stylized manner that distinguishes his Iowa landscapes from the more general Regionalist painting of his contemporaries. The new road cutting through the Iowa landscape reflects the modernization that was transforming the rural Midwest in the 1930s, and Wood's precisely modeled treatment gives the landscape a solidity and permanence that paradoxically makes the new road seem like a permanent feature of the Iowa countryside.
Why It Matters
New Road is Wood's Iowa landscape precisely modeled: a new road cutting through the countryside in the slightly stylized, precisely modeled manner that distinguishes his Regionalist painting from the more general work of Benton and Curry. The 1939 painting reflects the modernization of the rural Midwest with the solidity that makes the new seem permanent.
