Compare and Contrast

     There are many differences and similarities in the painting by Grant Wood in 1930 and the picture taken by Ben Shahn in 1935. The obvious facts would be that in both there is a man and a woman standing in front of a house. The differences being that the woman in on the left in the first and on the right in the second. The man in holding no pitchfork in the second picture. In the first picture, the couple had not yet gone through the Great Depression. They have nice, formal looking clothes, the man has glasses, and in the background is there home which is a very nice white, manufactured, two story house. The windows are more expensive looking than in the second picture.
     In the second photo taken during the Great Depression, the man and the woman stand right next to their log cabin. It looks sturdy, but is no where near as nice or fancy as the other one.  It cannot be determined whether it is one story or more. The clothes of the man and his wife as worn-out. The man holds no tools and has no glass because he cannot afford them. He is not clean shaven like the other man, for he has no reason to be. The woman especially, but the man too in the second photo stand more slouched and tired than tall and proud. Their faces have no pride like those in the first, but rather are just hopeless and barely hanging on. They are just surviving. And who could ask them for more than that.

~Alayna~