American Gothic

Is there anyone who has not seen the painting of the sturdy Iowa farmer with his pitch-fork and his thin-lipped wife or daughter? Ever since it met the public eye in 1930, the work by Grant Wood entitled "American Gothic" has elicited admiration, disgust, reverence and ridicule. Painted by a self-proclaimed "bohemian" who studied in Paris, the image was first seen as a critique of Midwestern Puritanism and what H. L. Mencken called "the booboisie". During the Depression, it came to represent endurance in hard times through the quintessential American values of thrift, work and faith. Later, in television, advertising, politics and popular culture, "American Gothic" evolved into parody. With broad perspective, acute insight and humour, Steven Biel explores the strangely enduring life of America's most popular painting.