Gannam's paintings adorned stories in popular magazines for many years. He also painted a popular series of advertisements for sheets and blankets.
Neither Winslow Homer nor Edward Hopper could hold a candle to Gannam when it came to portraying the deep emotional relationship between a housewife and her new blanket.
But don't be fooled. Look closely and you will see the work of a serious and accomplished watercolorist.
Many of Gannam's paintings were published in cropped form, accompanied by intrusive headlines and graphics like these:
But when you look at the originals, you see Gannam's mastery at work:
Little details like this row of flowers demonstrate how Gannam kept looking hard all the time. Gannam didn't use a rote formula or lapse into photorealistic tracing.
These watercolors could fit quite comfortably on the same wall with the work of Homer and Hopper.
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