A painting that portrays an Eastern Iowa farmstead won 3rd Prize at the 2023 Iowa State Fair. Titled Legacies on the Forret Farmstead, the work features a refurbished John Deere tractor on the Forret family farm, located near Calamus, Iowa. The painting is acrylic on canvas. (A complete story behind the painting can be seen here)
Marlow has earned 4 First Prizes in painting at the Iowa State Fair since 2018. Overall, he has created 8 award-winners in the past 7 years of the juried competition, taking First Prize in both oils and acrylics at the 2020 competition. Marlow’s work has been accepted into the juried exhibition every year since he first entered in 2014.
Historically, the Iowa State Fair Fine Arts competition features work by some of Iowa’s best artists. Iowa native Grant Wood won the competition 4 years in a row, before painting his iconic portrait, “American Gothic” in 1930. American Gothic is considered to be the most recognized portrait in the world, after the Mona Lisa.
Over 1 million people attend the fair annually, and the Fine Arts Gallery is a visitor favorite.