Printable sheet
American Gothic painting by Grant Wood: a stern pair with a pitchfork before a house with a Gothic window. An art printable for kids; free PDF.
Printable sheet
Free for personal and educational use
Download PDFPrintA woman with a cameo brooch and polka-dot dress beside a man in round glasses and a jacket holding a pitchfork, a wooden house with a Gothic window and the Grant Wood signature.
Use earthy tones for the clothes and house and a pale blue sky behind.
Find every place where the pitchfork shape repeats in the picture.
The house that inspired the painting still stands and welcomes visitors in Eldon, Iowa.
The American Gothic painting is one of the most recognizable images in the United States. Grant Wood painted it in 1930, and it belongs to the Art Institute of Chicago. It shows a stern farmer holding a pitchfork next to a woman, standing in front of a white wooden farmhouse.
The idea came to Wood when he spotted a small house in Eldon, Iowa, with an upstairs window shaped like a pointed arch, in the Gothic Revival style. He found it funny that such a modest home had a church-style window, and he imagined the kind of people who might live there. That window gave the painting its name.
Wood asked his sister and his dentist to pose, though they never actually stood together in front of the house. He said the pair were a farmer and his daughter, but many people assume they are husband and wife. Look closely and you will see the pitchfork shape echoed in the stitching on the man's overalls and in the window.
Wood belonged to regionalism, an art movement that celebrated rural life in the Midwest. The painting won a prize in Chicago and quickly became famous. Today it is one of the most copied and parodied images ever, with cartoon characters, pets and celebrities striking the same pose.
