Hidden Histories:
A Queer and Trans Art Journey

Did you know that Grant Wood, the artist behind American Gothic (1930), was queer? While his famous painting is often seen as a straightforward depiction of rural America, a closer look at Wood’s life reveals a much more complex story. His personal experiences—his deep bond with his sister Nan (who posed for the painting), his close relationships with male assistants, and his coded artistic expressions—challenge the traditional narrative surrounding his work. As the Whitney Museum’s recent retrospective put it, “Wood’s homosexuality is the code that unlocks the truth to his art.”

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In this innovative online art history course, we’ll uncover the hidden histories of queer and trans artists from 1830 onward, exploring how gender and sexuality have shaped art and society across time and across the Atlantic. From 19th-century painters navigating coded visual languages, such as Thomas Eakins, John Singer Sargent and Rosa Bonheur, to the transatlantic currents of 20th-century modernism in the works of Charles Demuth, Marsden Hartley, Claude Cahun and Marcel Duchamp, we’ll examine how queer and trans identities have influenced artistic movements in ways that mainstream history has often overlooked.