![Grant Wood - The Birthplace of Herbert Hoover, West Branch, Iowa [1931]](http://c4.staticflickr.com/4/3716/19042566442_1d45267a95_o.jpg)
Grant Wood captured the essence of small town mid-America in his 1931 Birthplace of Herbert Hoover. Working in autumnal tones with imaginative patterns precisely depicted, the Iowa artist painted the birthplace of his state's most famous native son. The house where Hoover was born was actually only the rear portion of the larger building that spreads across the vast lawn in the middle ground of the painting.
The small figure pointing to the house like a tour guide comes down through art history as a device to draw viewers' attention to what is important in a landscape. In 19th-century American prints and paintings, similar figures were often used to point out a beautiful view or important site, such as Niagara Falls. Wood would use a larger variation of such a character in Parson Weems' Fable (1939) where the myth-making cleric in the foreground points to the father of Washington, young George, and the mutilated cherry tree.
[Minneapolis Institute of Arts - Oil on masonite, 75.2 x 101 cm]