I have spent a lot of time over the last year looking at Pete Beard's collection of art histories on UTube.
Just to get you started, here is #1 of literally hundreds of all kinds of artwork including comments on how the artists coped with changing technology and major events such as the World Wars.

Here's one I stumbled across recently and really like - Jimmy Hatlo's work.

One thing I have learned is that my idea that Tolkien was the main originator of fantasy was completely wrong. Over and over in these art history studies are references to fairytales for children and fantasies for adults.


UNSUNG HEROES OF ILLUSTRATION 8 - YouTube

Here's one with two early Americans and a German-American that most of us have never heard of, but are quite good illustrators with distinctive styles.
I wish that modern American books were more like the kind of stuff shown here, this looks interesting - especially for children, where liberal politics has become way too prevalent.

Pete Beard is just awesome at this.

I hope he takes up another interesting topic next, though this one seems endless for his research/take.