Grant Wood was a regionalist artist who continually sought to capture the idyllic beauty of America's farmland. In 1930 he was wandering around his Iowa hometown looking for inspiration when he came across a house that left him enchanted. From this meeting the iconic American American Gothic was born. Not long after Wood's masterpiece was completed, the once-ideal countryside and the people who cared for it were overwhelmed by despair and suffering when the Great Depression hit. It was a period of economic difficulty that affected almost all nations. The American stock market crashed in 1929, and by 1933, millions of Americans found themselves out of work and consequently without adequate food, shelter, and other necessities. In 1935, things took a turn for the worse when strong winds and dust storms destroyed the southern Great Plains in the event that became known as the Dust Bowl. Farmers, who had managed to fall back on their crops during past depressions, were hit especially hard. Without jobs, a way to live, or any other source of income, many farms were foreclosed, leaving countless families hungry and homeless. Ben Shahn, a man of Lithuanian origin who had a deep passion for social injustice, captures the well-known desperation of the Great Depression through his photography Rural Rehabilitation Client. Shahn and Wood use their art to represent the desperation of everyday American farmers due to the terrors and adverse repercussions brought on by the Great Depression. The American Gothic and rural rehab client have similar focal points, a stern man and a hardened woman posing in front of the house. Although they both appear to be wearing their best clothes, it is clear that the two couples do not have access to equal resources. The man and... the center of the sheet... in the Rural Rehabilitation Client run horizontally and represent desperation. They symbolize that the couple's life will move forward but that does not mean it will go upwards. The diversity of the surface appearance of each image contributes to the different symbolism that each image contains. The Great Depression was one of the most difficult eras America has ever faced. It has torn families apart, leaving them with nothing but despair. Wood and Shahn use their images, American Gothic and Rural Rehabilitation Client, to represent this feeling of anguish. American Gothic shows the anxiety of those who experienced the first ripples of the Depression and Rural Rehabilitation Client shows the sheer desperation of those who lived during the worst days of the Depression. Through these two works of art, feelings of hope and despair are powerfully depicted.