Artworks by 20 North Gallery-represented artist Adam Grant on view at Midwest Museum of American Art
Grant works on paper from Elkhart, Indiana Museum’s collection included in “Politics & Religion” exhibition
On May 10, 2025, 20 North Gallery visited the Midwest Museum of American Art (Elkhart, Indiana) as the institution celebrated its 46th anniversary. Among the featured exhibitions on view during the milestone event was Politics & Religion: Artists Speak Out!, a selection of artworks from the Midwest Museum of American Art’s (MMAA) permanent collection, complemented by loaned works from artists and collectors in Michigan & Indiana. The Politics & Religion exhibit comprises over 50 artworks exploring themes of social justice, immigration, religious symbolism, satire and protest. Included in the exhibition are 2 works on paper by Adam Grant.
20 North Gallery Owner Eric Hillenbrand and Art Director Condessa Croninger represented the gallery at a May 10 event, which marked the Midwest Museum of American Art’s 46th anniversary. While at the museum, Croninger and Hillenbrand viewed the watercolor, Seeds of Rebirth and ink on paper, Seeds of Destruction by Adam Grant, recently installed from the museum’s collection. The 2 artworks (signed A. Grochowski), were completed by Grant in 1946 as part of his Holocaust Series, created while he was in a displaced persons camp in Regensburg, Germany.
A survivor of the Nazi concentration camps Auschwitz and Mauthausen, Grant painted his cathartic and allegorical Holocaust Series of works on paper in an attempt to exorcise the horrors he experienced during the Holocaust. 20 North Gallery Art Director Condessa Croninger states, “An artist and Holocaust documenter, Adam Grant was a brilliant individual, a gifted artist and a very brave man. As the Adam Grant Art Estate representative, 20 North Gallery is proud to view Adam’s art from the permanent collection of the Midwest Museum of American Art, displayed in their current exhibition, Politics & Religion: Artists Speak Out!. Not only were we delighted to see these works on display, but we are sure our Artistic Director Emerita, the late Peggy Grant (Adam’s artistic executrix) would also have been pleased to know that these paintings which she had bequeathed to the Midwest Museum are so valued and pertinent to contemporary exhibition.”
Adam Grant (b. 1924; Warsaw, Poland – d. 1992; Toledo, Ohio)
Born in Warsaw, Poland in 1924, Adam Grochowski was discouraged by his family from pursuing a professional art career. In his teens, Adam was sent to the Nazi concentration camps Auschwitz and Mauthausen, where he traded his art for bread, enabling him to survive. After the liberation, Adam spent 5 years in a refugee camp. He emigrated to the United Sates in 1950, securing a job with the Palmer Paint Company in Detroit (Michigan), that had begun to produce the now-legendary Paint By Number kits. There, Adam met fellow designer and future wife, Margaret “Peggy” Brennan. Americanizing his name, the new Mr. and Mrs. Grant moved to Toledo (Ohio), where Peggy managed his fine art career and Adam painted until his death in 1992.
During his lifetime, Grant’s fine art was widely exhibited in galleries and museums, as well as juried and solo exhibits throughout the world, frequently garnering prestigious awards. Later, his widow, the late Peggy Grant, as the executrix of his artistic estate, organized and facilitated exhibits of his work in Ohio, Indiana, Poland and Saudi Arabia. Grant’s work is part of numerous prestigious private, corporate and public collections, including the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American Art, Washington, D.C.; The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, Florida; Collegium Maius Museum-Krakow, Poland; Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio; The University of Toledo; the Polish Embassy in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; and Auschwitz Museum, Poland. 20 North Gallery is honored to have been selected by Mrs. Grant to serve as the estate representatives for Adam Grant’s artistic legacy.
To view Adam Grant’s full artist biography, visit his represented artist page.
Politics & Religion: Artists Speak Out! will continue at the Midwest Museum of American Art (29 S Main St, Elkhart, IN 46516) through June 8, 2025.