American Gothic by Grant Wood

There are well-known paintings and then there are really well-known paintings. But if one work of art has earned the label of American icon, then it is most certainly Grant Wood's American Gothic. Disturbingly enigmatic to this day, as it is most likely a subtle mix of praise and satire, this 1930 painting of a scowling farm couple posed before a white Gothic-style farm house has become one of the most easily recognizable images of popular culture. Wood continually denied ever intentionally having poked fun at American Midwestern life, by the way, but one can't help but think that is precisely what is going on here.

Grant Wood was an Iowa native obsessed with painting and had travelled several times to Europe to immerse himself in the many masterpieces there. On one trip through Germany, he was particularly impressed with certain works by Flemish paintings he had seen in a Munich museum, particularly with the utter simplicity of the subjects and the representational nature of their works. Struck by this "revelation", he decided to apply this technique (or lack of it?) to his paintings back home. Not long after, while driving around the Midwestern countryside in search of appropriate subjects, he discovered a house near Eldon, Iowa which absolutely fascinated him. Something told him he had found the place, which, of course, he had. The modest structure with it's now famous gothic-style window was then used as the backdrop for the two models he placed before it, in this instance his younger sister and his dentist.

When studying Grant Wood's painting, one gets the impression that it is a visual pun of sorts. If you look closely, you can see how the pointed arched window refers to other similar forms found in the painting, among them the farmer's pitchfork, his overalls and even the form and the lines of his hardened face. And the more one looks at American Gothic, the more one is struck by other similarities. A lot like the way people say that their pets begin to resemble them with time, so too with this not-so-hidden Gothic elements of Wood's work.

It's certainly not an insult to call this painting simple, the painting is simple indeed. But there is something behind this very simplicity that makes it all the more complicated, and very ambiguous, as well. And this strange ambiguity is probably what has made Wood's painting endure as long it has. As ironic as it sounds, one expert at the Art Institute of Chicago, where American Gothic is on display, has said "I think what strikes you from the beginning is that you're with one of the most exciting couples in the history of art."